


One Foot in Front of the Other

by HartwinMakethMan



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Body Dysmorphic Disorder, Canon Divergence - Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Depression, Eating Disorders, Emotional handjobs, Established Relationship, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Recovery Bucky Barnes, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Bucky Barnes, Stark Tower, Steve Rogers Feels, Stucky - Freeform, Suicidal Thoughts, are you worried about steve rogers?, so is everyone else, you should be
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-19
Updated: 2017-09-23
Packaged: 2018-12-04 00:15:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 36,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11543415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HartwinMakethMan/pseuds/HartwinMakethMan
Summary: Bucky was home-- he'd shown up at Steve's suite in Stark Tower fresh off his HYDRA Revenge Tour several months ago. Since then, swamped with rehabilitating the former Winter Soldier, people had mostly stopped worrying about Steve. He was doing better, really. He was. Just ask him, he'll totally tell you the truth. He's really fine.So, that's what everyone goes with. Maybe it's just easier to believe him rather than look for all the signs to the contrary.Until, after Bucky has mostly reclaimed himself-- his mind, his body, his memories-- a perfect storm of conditions hits the Tower and forces a few things to light about Steve and his less than satisfactory coping mechanisms.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This might be a oneshot, I might write some more of Steve's recovery, depending on how I'm feeling and if you leave comments telling me you would like that. So, if you like it, please drop me a line! 
> 
> Parts of Steve's experience are heavily based on my own. Be kind, please. It took a lot for me to put it down in writing.
> 
> All mistakes are my own, this is inbetaed. Sorry if it is rife with grammatical tragedies.

When they were home in Brooklyn, if Steve was feeling well enough, and could drag Bucky's ass out of their little bed, they'd take to the fire escape stairs until they reached the rooftop. Huffing and puffing for air from the flights of rickety steps-- at least, Steve would be-- they would take their usual seats on the ledge facing the east, still in their threadbare pajamas, and watch the first streaks of light come up over the city. 

 

"It's more pink than orange today, Stevie." Buck would say while the other flipped his sketchbook open to a new page and gave him a tender, crooked smile. The kind Steve only reserved for these quiet moments, just for him. Bucky'd clear his throat from the last of the sleepy hoarseness in his voice as the sun kept rising higher. 

 

"Clouds're all fluffy, turnin' red, but the tops are still purple an' blue." 

 

"I'm colorblind, not blind, you jerk. I know clouds're fluffy." Steve would grouse "Bucky, sit still-- you're ruinin' my line." He'd rag on him fondly, rolling his eyes. 

 

Every time they did it, from the first hot summers of their friendship, running past Sarah to the wrought iron stairs, all the way to 1942, just before everything would change forever, it went the same way. Describing the sunrise, sketching Bucky's profile in the strengthening daylight, sniping at each other harmlessly. Ultimately, enjoying the relative silence of dawn in the City.

 

Now, there was no summer breeze in the air while Steve watched the sunrise from his massive bedroom windows in the Tower. There was no need to describe the pinks and reds of the sunrise to a man with perfect vision. And there was definitely no sneaking past Ma to get to the rooftop before the sun rose too high.  But, the light of the morning pouring in from the east still lit up Bucky's features like he was glowing, and Steve couldn't resist the urge to put down on paper the smooth planes of muscle and sharp lines of the man sleeping in the too-big, too-soft California King mattress that Tony had too kindly insisted on buying for Steve's suite. The first outline of Bucky's sleeping body looked up at Steve from his sketchbook and he blinked at it with heavy, itching blue eyes.

 

He was so goddamn tired. His eyes burned and his throat was tight and dry. He ran a hand through his messy blonde hair and repressed a yawn, which didn't quite work. His eyes watered, and he couldn't tell if he was going to cry or not. Steve's muscles were sore and his spine ached. He felt like he was made of stone, the only movement being his hand on the page as the shadows and sunlight played across his lover's body, and Bucky looked impossibly beautiful. It was the third night in a row that week where Bucky was actually able to sleep through the whole night. Steve had to swallow around the envy clawing up his throat. This was a breakthrough in his recovery, and Steve was so proud of him, really, he was. The last nine months had been hard on all of them. 

 

"Stevie...?" Bucky's voice still held the hoarseness of sleep as he mumbled from his place in the bed. He lifted his head to look at him with bleary eyes, somehow still scrutinizing as they looked him up and down from the too-cushy pillows. Steve felt heat flood his cheeks, and he hoped Buck wouldn't see it in the dawn light. 

 

He did. Of course he did. Steve was still used to being able to hide things from people like he had since he'd been defrosted, but he never could with Bucky. 

 

"C'mere..." Buck pulled back the covers over Steve's side of the bed and patted it softly "C'mon Babydoll-- what're you doin' up so early again?" 

 

God, sometimes it was so damn easy to pretend that nothing had changed since sunrises and fire escapes. Steve's chest felt too full and too empty at the same time as he set aside his sketch and went to burrow into the blankets by Bucky's side. He didn't hesitate to wrap both his flesh and metal arms tight around him and press him to his chest. Bucky's heartbeat thumped under his ear and Steve sighed out a long exhale that he hadn't known he was holding. He relaxed into the only thing that remained familiar over decades of ice and fire. 

 

It was silent for a good while after that, and Steve breathed in Bucky's scent, listening to the steady thump of his heart. All other white noise that the serum picked up seemed to fade away. Maybe he could sleep like this. Maybe he could manage a couple hours... 

 

But, the second he finally dared close his eyes, everything was going to shit all over again: Bucky was falling, screaming Steve's name, and Steve was falling too. He plummeted down into icy depths, holding onto Peggy's last words to him and hoping Bucky would be there for him on the other side, waiting with his Ma. But it was just pitch dark and fucking freezing, shocking his system, making him gasp in a lungful of arctic water and choke on it. He was paralyzed in the jet, sinking fast and into this vast darkness. Everything was empty and he was so cold, but his lungs burned. It made pneumonia look like a piece of cake. It made him wish for asthma--

 

"Steve!"

 

A hundred things seemed to hit Steve at once as he startled awake, bolting upright. It was too cold, his every nerve was jumping under his skin. He could feel every thread in the sheets, every plate in Bucky's arm-- even his own clothes were too much. His skin was tight, and he felt like he was going to explode into red hot blood and guts and viscera. Like all the other good men on the front lines, or like putting rubber bands around a watermelon, or like a bomb. He was a living bomb. There was an electric humming in his ears, reverberating into his head, and he couldn't breathe, he couldn't breathe.

 

He couldn't remember reaching the shower, but the water was scalding hot as he stepped in and let it burn into his back muscles.

 

The return to Earth was slow. It always was. Steve wasn't sure how long he stood under the steaming spray until his legs wouldn't support him anymore. Not everything hurt anymore-- just the skin of his back as the water did it's job. He was in 2015. The water was hot, and he was in pain, and it was 2015. He took a deep, shuddering breath.

 

"Jesus H, Steve, that's hot.." He heard him before he saw or felt him, and then the water was only warm. He made some sort of noise, he had to have, because Bucky, naked and broad and beautiful, was standing in the shower and crouching down to get him. He supported most of Steve's weight as he pulled him to standing, and Steve was making the most pathetic little whimpering noises as Bucky soothed him "It's okay, Babydoll, you're alright.... Do you know where you are? It's 2015, and you're safe with me..."

 

Steve was shaking, but he was coming back under his own control, breathing deep and even. Bucky was shaking too, and Steve felt like the lowest dirt.

 

He'd worked so hard to not burden Bucky with this. But instead, he'd scared him. After all Bucky had been through, Steve was the one to scare him. He felt soft, sucking kisses pressed to his neck and shoulders, the side of his head. A hand ran across the burned expanse of his back, and stung too badly for Steve to be able to tell if it was metal or flesh.

 

"You oughta go see Sam. Stevie. You seen how good I've been lately? He's helping me, too. Even Natasha talks to him." Bucky murmured into his wet skin, still kissing him between words. Steve just shook his head. He'd been shaking his head at that since long before Bucky came home. The thought of it made him feel so ashamed, and Bucky shouldn't be the one comforting him anyway-- shouldn't this be the other way around? Bucky was the tortured and brainwashed one, Steve took a nap for the better part of a century. No one ever let him forget that.

 

He didn't let himself cry again until Bucky went back to sleep. Laying in his arms again, Steve desperately tried to keep himself awake, repressing his sobs until his ribs ached. By the time the day truly began, Steve was fine. He would be okay, really. He would make himself be okay.

 

\-------

       

_Five weeks later.... _

Bucky was recovering well, all things considered. He talked normally, although he didn't often, and he laughed with Clint and Sam-- Hell, he got along with just about everybody. Sometimes he even showed up in the lab to watch Tony work. It was silent and intimidating at first, and he'd shooed the shadowy figure away. But after a while, he just stopped making him go. And then the questions started, and Damn, the guy barely stopped to breathe, asking about all his inventions, and talking about going to watch his dad's science fairs, and Steve. Insert "heart eyes" there. He would literally talk about anything about Steve, it was annoying but... cute?

 

And through all that time that he spent, running his mouth in the workshop like they were pals or something, Bucky still hadn't let him run any diagnostics on that wet dream of a cybernetic arm that he had. It was so tempting, it was the worst kind of torture for an engineering genius like him.

 

Tony was pissed off, honestly, and he was going to say something regrettable until Pepper said in her prim, sweet voice one night when it was just the two of them "You know, he's reclaiming himself after all the memories and emotions he lost. He's probably saying all this stuff so he won't forget again. That's what Sam says." And that was just too sad for Tony to go around yelling at anybody. Especially the Cap's scary emo assassin boyfriend.

 

Now, the company was actually pretty nice. It was okay. He was smart for an old timer, and it was good to have someone who wasn't (entirely) made out of wires to bounce ideas off of. Barnes filled up space like he was still learning how to, and now that he was mostly past the catatonic and constantly panicked and suspicious phases in recovery, it was an infectiously pleasant process to watch him reclaim himself.

 

Aunt Peg had always said he had been a charmer. And Cap actually smiled every once and a while nowadays, which was kind of a miracle. He could probably count on one hand the amount of times he'd seen that since their fearless leader had defrosted. But, if RoboCop could change that, then Tony was more than happy to have Bucky stay.

 

The Avengers had fallen into a tenuous routine when Bucky (and by association, Cap) started to show signs of life again a few months back, and despite their best efforts to remain on alert, it had been easy for it to become comfortable. Brucie Goose and Pep were always up on the communal floor first, even though Cap was the first one awake (he always went for a fucking ridiculously long run, though, and then an equally long shower-- Tony paid those water bills, he knew the one adding an extra zero to it was the good ole King of "Waste Not, Want Not"). Romanov would wander in sometime after Tony, depending on if he was working in the lab and forgot to sleep or not. The Birdbrains were there by 9 with the geriatric lovers themselves just behind them. Bucky most definitely was joining Rogers in that long ass shower. Tony  knew  it, no matter how many red-faced non-answers he received from the mascot of Apple Pie.

 

This morning was no different, and he steadfastly ignored the warm swelling feeling of happiness and some other mushy thing as they all gathered around the coffee and Bruce started flipping and dishing pancakes.

 

"Well, look at you, Capsicle" Tony gave a whistle for effect "you sure are defrosting." There were some dramatic eyebrow raises in there somewhere.

 

Steve just sipped his coffee, rolling his eyes. Bucky kissed the top of his damp hair as he reached over Steve to get them both plates of breakfast. Clint joined him in chorusing "ewwwww" and Natasha poked Steve in the very visible hickey on his neck.

 

Rogers nearly spat out his coffee. They all laughed.

 

"I hope I'm not interrupting anything."

 

Of course, that was when it all started to fall apart. With Nick Fury at the threshold of the kitchen, not dead (which they all, of course, knew) and with a Stark Tablet in his hands.

 

"Director Fury, you're early. Would you like a cup of coffee?" Pepper was the quickest among them with a smile and some diplomacy. 

 

"No, thank you, Ms. Potts."

 

"Everything alright?" Steve spoke up, now fully awake and all business in that stoic, "true hero" kind of way he had.

 

"Just fine, no massive threat-- just a one man mission. And I've got a man in mind." He walked slowly over to stand in front of Bucky. He tightened his metal arm a little around Cap's shoulders, making it whir softly. Fury slid the tablet onto the kitchen island next to his half eaten pancakes. "I'll be requiring your skill set, Sergeant Barnes."

 

The whole floor went entirely silent, and Barnes's eyes went wide.

 

"What d'you mean by "skill set"?" Steve was the one to break the silence, sounding like he did when Tony poked too deep in a fight. Bucky was still speechless. Really, he shouldn't have been-- he was only the most lethal sniper in history, of course Fury wanted to use him.

 

"Covert op with long range and potential hand to hand requirements-- get the intel, get out. That's all I can tell you, Cap." He looked back down at Barnes "I need to brief you privately if you're on board."

 

Bucky was just frowning down at the tablet. Steve opened his mouth to go again, chest all puffed up and ready to fight, when Barnes spoke.

 

"Why me?" He nearly whispered, still finding his voice "Clint and I have exactly the same "skill set", so what aren't you saying?" His eyes flashed and his jaw clenched. No one had ever seen Bucky get truly angry before, not really. Just the blankness of the Soldier or the suspicion of his first few months. "Is this some kinda test? I'm not gonna kill anybody for you."

 

"You are gifted, Sergeant. If you are going to fight with the rest of the Avengers, however, we need to make sure you are mentally ready--"

 

"You never asked if I even wanted to be an Avenger!" Fury looked unfazed, but Tony personally, was loving it as Barnes ripped him into him. Steve looked torn between rage and pride for his (partner? Boyfriend? Long estranged childhood sweetheart?) person. He kept his mouth shut, and so did the rest of them, gaping at the scene over cooling pancakes. "Maybe out there, watching Steve's six, but I'm not killing anyone on orders anymore--"

 

"If you want to fight with Steve you'll need to prove that there will be no flashbacks, relapses, or any other remnants of the Winter Soldier. The only way to test that is to bring you in on a small scale mission. Minimal possibility for civilian casualty, and absolutely no assassinations. The new SHIELD does not operate in senseless murder." Fury cleared his throat, gesturing down at the tablet "I need to brief you in private." And he just walked away, expecting that Bucky would follow. He was looking at the blank screen like if he touched it, it would burn him.

 

He pushed his chair back and stood. Steve immediately stood too, catching his metal wrist as Bucky grabbed the thin tablet and went to follow.

 

"Buck. You don't have to do anything you don't wanna do." He put up a hand to Bucky's cheek and he leaned into it, and it was all so intimate and shit, Tony felt like he was intruding in his own tower. "I'll be okay out there, you don't have to do it. You've worked so hard..."

 

"I need to do this, Stevie. He said small scale, and I need to... I need to test myself. Make sure I can still do my real job, lookin' after your sorry ass." He kissed the corner of his mouth. "I'll stop back before I leave, let you know how long I'll be gone. Eat something, please? Okay?" He gestured at the forgotten pancakes, and looked weary and nervous. Steve looked pinched, but he nodded woodenly.

 

"Okay, Buck."

 

After they all watched Barnes go, it was like Cap remembered that all of them were there. He turned around and looked at them with this terribly out of place helplessness for a moment, before seemingly realizing who he was and who he was looking at. He schooled his expression back to his default Captain America stoicism, and it twisted something in Tony to see it. Sam walked around the kitchen island, taking Steve's elbow like he thought he was going to fall over.

 

"He's making a mistake." He muttered hoarsely.

 

"He could be. He could also be making a breakthrough in his recovery." Sam replied softly.

 

Steve tugged his arm out of his friend's hold, and started walking to the elevator, calling something behind him about going for a run.

 

And the rest of them were left in the quiet.

 

"Didn't he already run today?" Bruce spoke up.

 

"JARVIS?" Tony asked, because how the Hell were any of them supposed to know for sure?

 

" Captain Rogers took his usual 20 mile run starting at 5:03 am, Sir."

 

Well, that answered that question.

 

\--------

 

Barnes left that afternoon. Nobody but Steve saw him before he left, and now he was in the gym. Beating the shit out of a vinyl bag.

 

At least he had bothered to wrap his hands first this time.

 

"Haven't you already taken two runs today, Rogers? Take a nap or something." Sam forced the concern out of his voice. Mostly. Not like Steve would typically notice too much of that kind of thing anyway.

 

"Just got a lot on my mind." He replied, actually a little out of breath. Sam raised an eyebrow at that-- this was the same man who literally ran circles around him when they met, right? Out of breath didn't just _happen_ for Steve. Not with the serum. 

 

"Wanna share?"

 

He shook his head, but said nothing.

 

Out of everyone in the Tower (except Bucky), Sam liked to think he knew Steve the best. They'd lived out of each other's pockets for months, scouring the Earth for Barnes after D.C., and that gives you at least a little more insight into the kind of guy Cap was.

 

Private. Kind of a shut in. Borderline delusional in his refusal to acknowledge his own trauma, and more stubborn than anyone Sam had ever met. Actually super funny and sarcastic, and much dirtier than the history books would have you believe. Despite his better judgement sometimes, Sam had grown quite attached to Steve, and it never ceased to make his heart and head ache with both concern and irritation when his friend would insist on drawing in on himself like this.

 

The ratio of time out of his room to time spent in the gym/running was the most reliable (and startling) gage of Steve's wellbeing. Which only meant that Sam, or Natasha, or  somebody  should have said something a whole lot sooner. Since the day they'd flown back stateside, Steve had shut down pretty much entirely. The only times he had ever been seen outside of his suite were the times when he was here, in the gym. Sometimes, Sam could get him to come up for lunch or dinner with the rest of the team, but even then he didn't do or say much.

 

After Barnes came back, though, everything seemed so much better. Steve was finally a step above saying he was "okay" or "fine". He was "pretty good". And while it didn't seem like much, that was an accomplishment.

 

But, maybe it wasn't what it looked like. God knows Steve was a bad liar, but it wasn't uncommon for him to just say things to get people off his back. And Sam should've seen it all coming. How many times had he talked to vets at the VA hospital who'd done that? How many times had Sam done that to his poor momma when he'd first come home from that desert? Maybe Steve had just finally had an adequate distraction when Bucky came home needing so much love and rehabilitation. He had needed Steve, he still did. But Steve needed him, too, and nobody seemed to realize that fact until Bucky's quinjet was already gone.

 

Back when Barnes first showed up, he spoke to no one but Steve. And if there was anyone else in the room, all bets were off. Not a peep. He just stared, tracking your every move from his self designated perch in the corner of the living space in Steve's suite. It took nearly a month before he would even speak to Steve in front of others.

 

It wasn't until a rainy day in his fourth month that Bucky broke his silence. Sam had been in the kitchen on Steve's floor, packing away groceries that Steve didn't know he had bought for him. For a man with a super metabolism, he forgot to eat more often than not. The groceries was usually a moot point, but damnit, Sam kept doing it.

 

"He's not doing well, is he?" Barnes's quiet voice was warmer and smoother than Sam expected, but still made him jump nearly ten feet in the air. The man was sneaky as all Hell.

 

"Jesus, Man." He caught his breath before realizing what he said. "Steve told you anything? What's going on?"

 

Barnes was quiet again, eyes flicking down to his mismatched hands as he wrung them together. For a minute Sam thought he had ruined it, and Bucky was overwhelmed or something. But he looked back up after a minute and stared Sam in the face.

 

"I wanna start some talk therapy. With you." His lips (that looked like they were bitten raw, thanks to the sleepless nights and flashbacks. Sam had heard the screams. Had even helped Steve calm him down a few times.) quirked up in a momentary glimpse of a smile. "Maybe... maybe if I go, then he will too?"

 

Sam had felt like he was walking on air. Yes, finally, some sort of progress.

 

Bucky had been talking to him twice a week since that morning. And yeah, Steve sat in on the first few sessions, but Bucky's plan didn't work out like he hoped. Steve was still refusing therapy, was still hiding himself away from the world. He forgot about food less often now, though, what with Bucky still on his diet to adjust back from whatever nasty protein drink HYDRA had had him on for 70 years. Steve ate to remind Bucky to eat.

 

Sam still worried. Looking at his friend right now, he felt pretty justified in that.

 

"Steve, let's get something to eat, okay? You didn't eat breakfast today, I saw you."

 

For a moment, he thought Steve was going to refuse that too. He was starting to bleed where the tape on his knuckles had slipped, and it could've been the light in the gym, but it looked like there were bags under his eyes. He had looked alright that morning, pink from a shower, Bucky's arms tight around him.

 

Now, he looked almost like Bucky had never even come home.

 

"Cmon-- it's the perfect weather to make my Momma's chicken soup. I'll teach you to make something other than cereal, let's go."

 

"Yeah, okay. Thanks Sam."

 

Sam let out a long breath that he hadn't known he was holding. Small victories were all you got with Steve, but if it kept them putting one foot in front of the other, Sam could cope with that.

 

\--------

 

Steve was fine. Really, he was okay. If he didn't think about Buck for too long, he was okay. It almost reminded him of when Bucky'd first marched off to war without him. When not being able to follow in his footsteps was the only thing worse than not knowing if he was safe.

 

He couldn't follow him now, either. He didn't even know where he was going.

 

"I'll be back in a week, Stevie. Tops." He had said, trying to placate the fear that he could see even as Steve tried so hard to hide it. Bucky cupped his face then, looking straight into his eyes with a nervous little smile before pressing his lips to his. "I'll be... I'll be fine, Steve. I'll come home soon." He said it like he was still trying to convince himself as much as him.

 

There was a little swell of something in Steve's chest whenever Bucky called the Tower "home". It was hampered though, by the downright terrifying idea of facing the Tower again without him. Like before Bucky ever came back, when Steve was still half frozen inside and all alone. He wanted to cry and grip at Bucky's hand like a child, his throat felt raw, and he felt that horribly familiar feeling of his skin getting tight and sensitive and everything felt too small. Even with Bucky, who didn't have to stoop at all to look him in the eye anymore, Steve felt so odd. He was so tall. He was so tall and big and he could hear the Stark tech that hummed in the walls, and he was so healthy that he couldn't die even when he'd tried--

 

"Babydoll?" Bucky was frowning now, like he had that morning when this had also happened. It was happening more often lately, and goddamnit Steve hated himself for it. Bucky had dealt with it a few times, but only lately, and they hadn't been too bad comparatively. That morning when he'd slid into the shower behind him, the worst of it had already passed. The shower had still been boiling hot, but Bucky changed that before promptly distracting him with his lips and tongue and hands. He made him feel small. So blessedly, familiarly  small . Steve forced himself to take deep breaths, keeping himself from flying off the edge. Not with Bucky there, he didn't need to know how bad it was. Bucky had enough of his own Hell to deal with. "Come on, Steve, breathe deep." He stroked his cheek so gently it almost didn't hurt, but Steve's eyes had still burned and wobbled with tears. Goddamnit. "Let's take a breath, sweetheart. It's 2015, we're together and alive and I love you so much. Baby, I need you to breathe." He was holding Steve with his face tucked into his neck now, rocking him back and forth in his arms. One of them was metal. Steve was tall and healthy and Bucky was even stronger than the work at the docks had ever been able to make him, and his arm was made of metal.

 

It was 2015. So much had changed, but they were both here .

 

The prickling heat started to fade away. Bucky was holding him. Things were so different, but at least he wasn't alone anymore.

 

"Buck?" He managed to croak out.

 

Somebody pounded at the bedroom door, sounding like heavy artillery to Steve's enhanced ears. "Barnes, it's time to go."

 

Fury. The warring shame and anger in Steve all boiled up, and he was barely able to push it back down. Bucky pulled away a little to look at him, but Steve couldn't meet his eyes. 70 years of torture and brainwashing just to come back and have to take care of a man who would never know suffering like he did. Bucky was worried about  him . Bucky was going on his first mission since breaking his conditioning and destroying all those HYDRA bases. He was worried about leaving Steve at home in their  cushy Manhattan high rise.

 

"Baby, if you can't sleep, if you need to talk, or if  this  happens again while I'm gone" they both knew it would. It had been happening so often lately-- the only reason Bucky knew was because Steve couldn't hide it anymore. "I need you to go find somebody, okay?" He guided Steve up to look at him with a hand under his chin, and Steve would never deny Bucky again, ever again, so he met his eyes. "And remember to eat something every once in a while. Please? Promise me?"

 

"Promise, Buck." He liked to think he wasn't lying. He could do it, Steve could keep this under control. No one had known before. No one had to now.

 

Fury pounded on the door again.

 

"Alright, alright!" Bucky called back "I'm comin'!" He looked back to Steve, ran a hand through his hair. He kissed him soundly, like he didn't want Steve's lips to stop tingling like that until he was back to do it again. He told Steve he loved him before he left.

 

Buck was just as tactile and handsy as he'd ever been before the war, and Steve was so grateful for that he could cry all over again. He had been so starved for touch and attention and love when Bucky first returned, it had taken all of his strength not to throw himself into his arms as soon as he saw him.

 

For the longest time (at least, it had felt like it) it was impossible to get close enough to touch Bucky at all. He stayed in the guest room that Steve usually used as an art studio. He never slept. He'd stand at the opposite side of the room from Steve, and ask him questions about each piece. He liked that room-- still did. Sometimes, if he had a hard night he'd still wander in there and leaf through the pages of old sketchbooks and new canvases.

 

That was where Steve found himself right then, after Fury swept Bucky away for his mission.

 

With all the spare time Steve had had, from defrost to Bucky's return, he had filled sketchbook after sketchbook with anything from home. The view from the fire escape from both apartments (Ma's, and His and Buck's), Mrs. O'Hanagan's nasty old cat, the rickety old bed he and buck had tried to be their quietest in. There were command tents and European countrysides, too. There were portraits. Of himself, skinny and angry, but he never finished them. Peggy, the commandos, the folks from that queer bar that he and Bucky had liked (it didn't have a name). His Ma. Bucky. There was a sketch for every expression Bucky could make, every outfit he owned, every possible lighting-- Hell, he had filled a whole sketchbook of just Bucky.

 

There were plenty of fully painted canvases of him, too. And of the others. For the longest time, Steve just kept them in piles, propped against the walls or shelves. It wasn't until Bucky started to organize them by subject, medium, and canvas size, that the room became anything more than a throw away space for the faces Steve was determined to never forget, but also could barely look at. Bucky liked organizing and categorizing and cleaning ever since he had come back. Sam called them his "Systems". They made him feel more comfortable in the Tower as he recovered, giving him a sense of order, letting him control what was around him. And Steve couldn't lie, always knowing where things were and how to find them made something tight in his chest loosen a little. It was refreshing to have some simplicity. Bucky said that it helped him focus after having such a simple life based on orders. It was a good thing to hold onto.

 

Stark called him "OCD", and Steve wanted to holler at him for it, but he was probably right. Despite their usual clashes, he never said it with any type of mocking or anything. He liked Bucky, and Bucky liked him (when Tony and Steve weren't fighting.), which was awfully weird to Steve.

 

He sat down on the bed in the corner of the spacious room, where it was now collecting dust. Bucky didn't sleep there anymore. He slept with Steve, letting Steve grip his hand pathetically every night. Like he would disappear if he let go, even if they were fucking, even if they were sleeping. Steve held Bucky so tight, anywhere and everywhere he could reach.

 

He supposed he should have been glad, Bucky was able to sleep through the night more often than not now. But, it seemed like every time he lay beside him and watched Bucky sleep, there was this horrible jealous feeling that clawed up his throat, warring with the peace and love that he usually felt while looking at Bucky. Steve didn't sleep. The humming in the walls and the acute awareness of his own strong, regular heartbeat made the quiet of the night so maddeningly loud. Every few days he could manage a couple hours, only to wake up in a cold sweat, shivering and disoriented. It had been worse before Bucky came back, like most things. Now, the only way he managed those few hours a week was by focusing on Bucky's heartbeat, his measured breaths.

 

At least it meant that Steve was always awake to comfort Bucky out of his nightmares. He didn't need any more than those few hours, and Bucky's recovery would always come first. He was a super soldier, and his body could function just fine without normal hours. Most days, his body seemed to function without him entirely.

 

Dinner that first night was fine. He filled everyone else in on the time Bucky would be gone, picking at his food as convincingly as possible. He knew objectively that he was hungry, somewhere in his brain and stomach, but everything churned and ached and eating more than once a day felt gluttonous and rich. He excused himself shortly after everyone else finished, hoping to go mostly unnoticed. Sam said something Steve couldn't quite hear over the electrical hum and the heartbeats of his friends and the silverware clatter. He felt his skin tightening like a filling water balloon, his supercharged nerves getting overstimulated by the brightness of the room and the rub of his clothes. He felt nauseous.

 

It had become almost normal, since the serum. Steve could go on as usual for a while, like a normal person, only better. After all, that was the point of the whole procedure, and Steve was the sole success. But after the course of a strenuous day or a long night, Steve's senses could overload. During the war, it was something he learned to grit his teeth through. Peggy helped. Howard even tried to help. But it wasn't until rescuing Bucky from that hellhole Zola had kept him in that anything started to get better. He kept Steve busy, reminded him of when he was small. With Bucky, he wasn't treated any differently for his newfound looks and strength, and it made it easier to ignore. The feeling had come in waves.

 

When he came out of the ice, though, there had been no Bucky. There was no Howard, and there was barely any of Peggy left in that hospital bed. There was no one to help ground him to who he was, before he became  this . A body and a symbol instead of a man. The New York he had known, the people he'd loved, the familiar noises muffled by his bum ear, the familiar feeling of having to look up just a little to look Bucky in the eyes. All of it was gone.

 

It wasn't like he wasn't grateful. He was the only success of the serum. Without it he would've died before his twenty-fifth birthday. And here he was, living in the new millennium, without scoliosis or asthma or a heart murmur. He could see in full color and hear anyone who spoke to him without straining. He was grateful for what Erskine had done-- it just came with its own set of side effects and a whole new world of responsibilities.

 

Steve was a relic, and even that wasn't him, it was  Captain America . A symbol. He was just a little guy living on borrowed time practically since he was born, hiding in a big costume of muscles and virtue and that fucking  shield .

 

He was so tired. And he had hoped (it seemed stupid now) that when he had Bucky back, he'd be grounded again. That maybe these feelings, or these horrible attacks would go away. It felt so naïve now, when he couldn't even confess to Bucky that it was happening again, let alone how bad it had gotten. He had had to figure it out for himself, ask Steve about it (and he was still so sweet, still asking Steve if he was okay, if he was eating enough, if he was sleeping, when Bucky was the one who was supposed to come to him for help.). Hell, Bucky had had to be the one woken up by  Steve's  nightmares the other night.

 

The first few days of Bucky's absence passed in a blur. Steve sketched all night, slid in and out of fitful sleep, and went for a run at five (the earliest acceptable time to leave the house, as Tony informed him when he caught him on his way out at 2 am one morning before Bucky came home). Sam or Natasha would visit once a day, and Steve felt like warmed up shit, but he knew it didn't show. The serum prevented him from looking as terribly overtired and broken as he felt. He couldn't sleep-- he'd tried. The bed was already too big and pillowy soft, and sheets were too silky and warm. Add onto that that Bucky wasn't there anymore, and there was no chance for any sleeping. He tried not to think about his promise. As long as he kept himself in check, everything would be fine.

 

It wasn't easy, and each attack seemed to be getting worse. They hit harder and faster, and they'd put him on his ass for hours, wiping him out. First, it was waking up in a cold sweat on the sofa in the living area, convinced that he was having an asthma attack. When he realized how big his body was, he felt his skin tighten like shrink wrap around him, strangling him. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't think, he didn't know where he was. When he came out of it, 5 hours had passed. He asked JARVIS for the date.

 

Then, it was unthinkingly jogging right up to the door of what used to be he and his Ma's old tenement building (refurbished and now used for offices in, poetically, immigration law). He ended up running an extra ten miles, trying to drown out the earth shattering noise of the street with the pounding of his racing heart. His feet were blistered by the time he returned.

 

After that, it was when he ripped open his knuckles going at the vinyl bag without any tape. He wasn't sure how long he was there for, but somewhere along the way he stopped seeing the bag and started seeing battles. His fists sounded like bombs to his sensitive ears, and the smell of blood brought him back to Azzano, and fighting the Red Skull on the jet. Even all the way back to scrapping in alleyways back home. By the time he came out of it, he was bruising his bones, and there was a pool of blood on the gym floor. He cleaned up the evidence on autopilot. He had gone back up to his suite and just sat on the bed, mesmerized and vaguely horrified as his skin slowly knit itself back together. That just made him sob, it wasn't even a proper attack. He couldn't quite explain it, but suddenly he felt so vast and hollow as he watched the new pink skin form over the bloody mess he'd made. There wasn't even a scar.

 

He spent a lot of time in the shower. After coming out of the ice, with no one to turn to, Steve had found that showering could make the attacks easier to bear.

 

There had never been hot water in his Ma's tenement, they hadn't even had their own bathroom. He and Buck had a shower room to share throughout all of their apartment building, but it was freezing cold. Bucky even took to heating water in the kettle and filling a tin tub for Steve, after he caught pneumonia from the coldness of the shower spray. The army was also distinctly lacking in hot water and any type of plumbing. So, the showers in the Tower and the hot water from the tap were strictly a convention of the new millennium.

 

Steve found himself standing under the spray, as hot as it could go, for undetermined amounts of time multiple times a day. Time faded and the burning pain of the scalding water became a reminder of when and where he was. It became an anchor for Steve while Bucky wasn't there. He always emerged from the steaming bathroom with dark pink burns and bloody scratches down his skin that he knew absently that he had put there.

 

Only four more days to go. Bucky had said a week. Tops. It felt like a lifetime, days and nights of desperately trying to hold himself together, waiting for Bucky. His promise hung like a noose in the back of his mind, but he just let himself disappear further into the beat of his feet running through Manhattan and across the bridge, or the sting of his knuckles tearing against the heavy bag. Or the burn of the shower.

 

He supposed he should have suspected that someone would show up at his door sooner or later.

 

"Hey Rogers, where've you been?" Of course it was Sam. And Natasha. Goddamnit.

 

Steve didn't really know what to say, he'd been sitting in the same position for hours with a sketchbook on his lap. It was still an empty page. It had been so long since he'd spoken to anyone. At least, it felt like it.

 

"I've been... here, mostly." He cleared his throat. Both of his friends were putting in such an effort to appear nonchalant that it almost made it worse. They thought he couldn't see it, but he could. Steve bit down on the irritation bubbling up his throat. Sam sat down across from him, Natasha next to him. They didn't seem to care that, despite being in a massive room full of furniture, they were sitting on the floor in a corner with eyes on all exit points. Bucky was usually the one who liked to sit here, but Steve had done it all the time when he had first defrosted. He still did it sometimes, but right then it just made him feel closer to Bucky.

 

Nat peaked her head around to see the empty sketchbook page. "Wow, you're working hard." She teased, smirking at him. It was forced, he could tell. Emotions were never really her strong suit. 

 

"I just... I just sat down to start." He lied.

 

They were quiet for a minute and the lie settled over the room. Suddenly, Steve felt completely exhausted.

 

"What're you guys doing here? Need somethin'?"

 

"Well, we'd love if you would come up to dinner tonight." Sam broached the topic lightly "It's been three days." It was the tone he used when he tried to get Steve to go down to the VA with him. Steve swallowed the bubbling irritation again, gripping his pencil.

 

"I haven't really been paying attention. I'm not all that hungry, though. You guys go on without me." Had it really been three days? He couldn't remember if he'd eaten a single time.

 

"You sure, Steve?"

 

"Yeah, I'm just kinda tired.." he stood to excuse himself, wobbling a little when his legs, which had been in the same position for so long, protested the movement. His sketchbook fell from his lap and the pages fluttered open. Natasha picked it up, seeing one of his latest sketches of Bucky. Drawing that face seemed like all he did anymore, trying to stave off the pit of worry threatening to swallow him whole.

 

She looked at the first sketch, flipped through a few, and she was damn smart, so she knew.

 

Her face went soft "Oh, Steve." She stood and went to touch him, and Steve wanted to be held. God, did he want to be held. But if he let himself fall apart right there, he couldn't trust himself to be able to put himself back together after. His skin was feeling itchy and tight.

 

Nat was so small, he'd never realized before. He was so massive next to her. His throat started to feel sore, and it was hard to breathe. He dodged her reaching hand as his skin started to burn and scrape against the suddenly coarse fabric of his clothes. He tried to force the feeling down, keep back the grimace of pain pulling at his lips. The sun was setting, but it was so bright for him. His blood pounded in his ears, and Sam and Nat's heartbeats. The words they were saying sounded nervous and worried, but Steve couldn't hear them over the goddamn humming in the walls.

 

A hand touched him-- it was callused and warm and it made him cry out as the agony tore up the sensitive skin of his arm and into his head. A migraine was building in the base of his skull from the overstimulation. He was trying to keep it from getting too bad, but it was too late. He needed to get to the shower, he needed the burning. Everything hurt, and his vision was blurred in the brightness of his suite, but he managed to stumble away from Natasha and Sam.

 

He shut the door to his bedroom before they could force their way in.

 

That was when the bombs started.

 

Logically, he knew that it was really Natasha and Sam pounding on his door, but the enemy blitz from that one mission in London, and the heavy artillery in France, even the explosions at Azzano, were passing through his head in waves of confusing memories and the noise echoed in his head.

 

He staggered into the bathroom and shouted hoarsely for JARVIS. The AI knew what to do at this point, turning on the shower head as hot as it would go while Steve ripped at his clothes clumsily until he was naked. They were probably ruined, but he didn't care. He wished he could just keep going sometimes, and rip at the muscly flesh until this claustrophobic body was destroyed. Maybe he'd find his real, small self inside.

 

\--------

 

Steve had been in the shower for ages. Sam was pacing like he could put a trench into the floor of the master bedroom, and Natasha sat ramrod straight on the edge of the bed, continuing to flip through their friend's most recent sketches.

 

"Sam." She finally broke through the white noise of the running water. Sometimes she thought she could hear crying on the other side of the door, but JARVIS wouldn't let them in.

 

"You can hear that, can't you? Why won't JARVIS let us in?! He could be hurting himself for all we know--"

 

"If Steve was truly endangering himself, JARVIS would say something." She hoped she was right "Come here, I need to show you something."

 

Sam finally came to stand in front of her, huffing and puffing with worry and fear. Wordlessly, she showed him the sketch.

 

"There are hundreds of these-- different settings, sometimes different people with him, but they all have something in common." Paying attention now, Sam took the book and tentatively flipped a few pages.

 

"He's always small." He said.

 

"And?" She prompted. There was a pit of dread deepening in her stomach, and she was hoping Sam would figure it out so she wouldn't have to say it.

 

"And... and they're unfinished?"

 

"Steve's face is missing. In all of them, it's the only part of the picture missing." She hated the rising panic in her chest, carefully keeping her voice even.

 

"He used to dissociate a lot. He tried to hide it, when we were on the road looking for Bucky. I thought it had gotten better... when Barnes was back and Steve had...  Shit ." He scrubbed a hand down his face, and she could see the guilt building up in his head, thinking of all the times he had let it go, or just not noticed Steve's little behaviors. She felt it too. Natasha prided herself on being observant, but when it came to those she really cared about, it all proved useless. "I thought he was doing better, but in his sessions, Bucky kept sayin' he was worried.  That  wasn't a normal panic attack-- that was something all new as far as I've seen with him." Sam swallowed hard and dropped down next to her on the edge of the bed.

 

They were quiet again for a moment. The water was still running. There was actually steam coming out from under the door.

 

"He flinched away from me..." she whispered. She hated that it hurt as much as it did, because she knew Steve had been confused and scared. But he had looked so pained, she couldn't stop running through it in her mind.

 

"He did from me too. I see you thinkin' about it. Stop thinking about it." Sam replied. He'd had plenty of traumatized vets shy away from him, Natasha was sure. But maybe never quite like Steve.

 

Her phone buzzed for the umpteenth time in her pocket. "Clint's been texting me for hours. We missed dinner."

 

"I'm not all that hungry anymore."

 

She wasn't either. Listening to one of her best and only friends sobbing and frantic through the door, especially after seeing what she'd just seen, Natasha's stomach was nothing more than a sinking pit of worry in her abdomen.

 

Then, the water stopped running. It was silent aside from the occasional sniffle or sigh. He had to know they were there-- people liked to write Steve off as nothing but muscle, but he was a smart guy. He knew his friends wouldn't just leave after that. Nat had no clue what to do. It didn't seem like Steve was coming out. Thank the universe that Sam was trained in this kind of thing, because she would be more comfortable diffusing a bomb.

 

"Steve?" Sam spoke tentatively into the wood of the bathroom door. "C'mon Man, can you open up? It's just Sam and Nat."

 

There was no response for a while, then "Give me an minute or two?"

 

"You already had a couple of those, Rogers, you've been in there for almost two whole hours." He was shaking his head "Please come out. You know we need to discuss what just happened out there."

 

Even as far away as she was, Natasha could hear the sharp inhale in the bathroom. Like a choked off sob.

 

And then Steve opened the door. Natasha did a ten second visual check for injuries, noting a few quickly healing scratches along his arms and the startling mottled pink color of his skin. How hot was that water? He was walking alright, his body language sheepish and drained. He was wearing a fresh tank top and pair of sweats.

 

"Lookin' a little ragged there, Rogers." Sam finally made a pitiful attempt at teasing, and it fell flat in the large, mostly empty room.

 

"I, um, I keep spare clothes in the bathroom. For workouts and showers." He said instead, answering a question no one had asked. But she could see the pile of ripped clothes he'd been wearing earlier. On the bathroom floor. Steve's voice was low and dripped exhaustion. Natasha could feel the effort it took to speak. Sam nodded, just trying to keep himself looking non threatening. If Steve shut them down, they would get nowhere.

 

He stood like a marionette in the center of the route between the bed and the bathroom door, and when Sam opened his mouth again, he just closed it back up again. Natasha, without really thinking, jumped right in (and right out of her comfort zone. But she loved Steve, and it hurt to see him hurt.).

 

"Come sit with me, _m **a** l’chik_ ." She said, patting the mattress beside her. When he hesitated, she had to internally shake herself against taking it personally. But, he walked over and settled next to her like he just didn't have the energy to sit up straight anymore. She resisted the urge to touch him, rub his violently mottled back. They sat for a minute, and she muttered "Are you injured at all? Looks like you tried to cook yourself."

 

"It helps." Steve stared straight ahead, not looking at either of them. Sam came to crouch in front of him, looking at him with big, plaintive eyes.

 

"Steve, that's called self harm. Like how Bucky used to yank on his arm, Buddy. Those are real burns, Man, you might think it helps, but you're hurting yourself." Steve just shook his head "Yes, it is. You're scaring us pretty bad.. I thought.... I thought you were doing better. Can you describe one of these.. these  episodes  for us?"

 

Steve inhaled deep and exhaled on a long sigh before replying "I'm so tired, I'm just gonna try an--"

 

"No-- no, not tonight, Steve. I've never seen anything like that before, and you..." he shot Natasha a desperate glance, looking for backup that she didn't really know how to give. Her concern won out over her discomfort after a quick second of thought, and she slowly raised a hand to rub at the damp hair at the nape of her friend's neck.

 

He leaned into it for a minute, and warmth bloomed in her chest as Steve let himself take comfort in her. She had no clue (well, maybe she did, she wasn't sure yet) what had happened that night, but he didn't seem scared of them, at least.

 

"Let us help you, _m **a** l’chik_ . Barnes'll be home soon, but we're here now. We want to look after you, you need us."

 

"I..." Steve breathed deeply again before lifting his head away from her hand "I gotta get some shut eye... I'm just tired. It's hard to... sleep. Without him here." He looked down at his lap with a frown, biting the inside of his cheek. Natasha stroked his damp hair. It had gotten long since Bucky came back, more like it had been when she and Steve had first met. Very forties, like he was trying to make Barnes feel more at home. Or maybe not. Maybe Steve was trying to feel more comfortable with  himself .... "I get so worried."

 

Sam nodded like that was all it was. Natasha barely resisted pursing her lips at him and shaking her head. He was making the mistake of trusting Steve to share his feelings. She saw right through him.

 

She wasn't saying that Steve wasn't tired or worried about James, but he was being selective. Steve was smart, and for all that he was a terrible liar, he was a master of half truths.

 

"Sounds like we're having a slumber party-- Meangirls or Clueless? Nat, you gotta braid my hair." Sam replied, sounding completely serious, and Natasha snorted a surprised laugh. Steve looked terribly pale, his burns fading, but his face shocked and confused. Like he wanted to say no, but didn't know how.

 

"That's-- that's unnecessary, I don't want to ruin your nigh--"

 

"Don't be ridiculous, Steve. I'm not letting you stay all by yourself in this big, empty suite. Not after what we just saw. Right, Natasha?"

 

"Right." She chimed in without a seconds hesitation, glad for both a reason to keep an eye on Steve and not having to come up with it herself.

 

Rogers looked positively betrayed.

 

"Besides, it's been three whole days. We missed you, Steve." She added, and that was genuine. She missed the Hell out of her friend. They had thought he would be able to look after himself without Bucky. They had decided to test it and they were so, so wrong.

 

When Steve had first come to stay at the Tower after D.C. she'd first realized it. She wished she could say it had been sooner, with all her spy training she should have been able to recognize the trauma and the grief the moment she had met him. But they all had those things, they were a toxic medley of broken souls. And out of all of them, who would ever look at Captain America and say "That is one unhealthy man incapable of looking after his own well being!"? With the serum and everything, people kind of expected that he would just  be okay . She was guilty of it, all of the Avengers were.

 

It was when he came back after DC, after spending a long eight months traipsing up and down and around the globe to look for a ghost, that she started to really see Steve's pain.

 

Knowing Steve from all the time they spent on the run and with the HYDRA infiltration into SHIELD, she could tell the difference now between Captain America's stoicism and depressed numbness. Sometimes he would forget himself and look at her like he was his actual age, tired and frightened and lonely, and her heart would swell to bursting at the responsibility and hardship thrown on his young shoulders. Steve was the youngest out of the whole team. 31 made him the baby of the group, and Natasha felt more like they should be protecting Steve than telling him to lead and never flinch.

 

Most of the time after DC and the witch hunt for James, he kept to himself. He could be found in the gym, or running the streets of Manhattan and Brooklyn like he was searching for something. Or running from something. Sam said he had had nightmares, and apparently dissociated. He had taken (and apparently still took) multiple, hours long showers per day, and beat himself bloody against the vinyl bags. He forgot himself and his health. He wasn't eating.

 

Now, slipping into the giant bed beside her friend (while Sam claimed the couch), it was as if Bucky had never come home to make him whole again. Steve looked so small, despite his big body, fading into the sheets and blankets. It was like he was the ghost now, not James.

 

He needed to come home soon. Steve needed him, and at this point, they all needed him too.

 

\---------

 

Steve didn't sleep. Natasha dropped off at some point in the night-- he heard her breathing change, but didn't know what time it was. Time was fluid and strange for him, and the idea of leaning over to look at the clock was just too much energy. Just lifting his arm or shifting positions was too much. He continued to lay there beside his friend, feeling like a scooped out pumpkin-- all hollow and scraped raw. The burns from the shower still stung.

 

The bed was so soft. So soft and silky and warm. He felt like he would get sucked right into the pillow top, suffocated by the sheets tangled up around him. He was sinking down and down, stuck between the desire to get up and run or simply close his eyes and not wake up. He wished it was the first time that he had thought about that, but it seemed like the oldest, most familiar thought in his head. He should've said something, maybe. Maybe he should have confided in Bucky-- he only asked every goddamn morning and every goddamn night "Are you okay, Stevie?", and "I hope I didn't ruin your night with all my racket. You been sleepin' alright?" saying it pointedly, like he knew that Steve just kept watch for him while he slept, waiting for one of Bucky's nightmares to save him from the quiet.

 

Steve hated himself for it, could never say it out loud, but Bucky's nightmares had become a solace almost as much as Bucky himself had. Of course, he hated the pain they caused him, but they broke up the seemingly endless, slow hours of darkness and gave Steve a purpose.

 

He lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. He wondered if Buck was having nightmares all alone on his mission during the nights. Was he suffering without Steve there to help him? His heart constricted in his chest impossibly more than before, and he opened his mouth to breathe (he'd been holding his breath, he was just realizing) but only let out a sob. The only noise in the gigantic suite, it bounced off the walls and into Steve's superhuman ears so loudly that he thought he'd wake everybody up. He flushed with the embarrassment and anticipation of Sam to burst in, or Natasha to wake up. After a few moments, no one stirred.

 

But Nat's breathing had changed. The suite was quiet again, and then he felt a tiny hand in his, which made him want to scream and sob and scratch at his skin all over again. The feeling was the worst, and most sudden of all of his attacks. He swallowed hard and focused on just breathing, desperate to not do this  again . He forced down the disgust and panic welling up inside him, and let out a long, silent exhale. He was worse than he had thought, worse than he had ever been, at least, since Bucky had come home. Nat squeezed his fingers and something in his chest loosened slightly.

 

"Steve?" She whispered gently.

 

He could barely find the breath to reply "Y-Yeah?"

 

If Steve couldn't hear her breathing pattern, he would've thought she'd drifted back off.

 

"Why didn't you say anything?" Guilt seized every part of him. Without even turning to look at her, he could feel the hurt in her voice. "Sam's good at this, and we'll all do what we can to....you're scaring me, Steve." Nat sighed and squeezed his hand again, tighter "Does James, at least, know?"

 

Steve didn't say anything, as if the too perfect body he was in wouldn't allow him to lie anymore. His mouth, his tongue, his jaw, were all glued in place. Hot tears welled up and blurred his blank view of the ceiling, but Steve refused to let them fall. It wasn't that Bucky didn't know, but he didn't know the full extent. That was a lie in its own way.

 

" Steve ." He could feel her eyes burning into him. The shame felt hot in his cheeks and tightened his throat. One tear made a track down his face. He wasn't even sure why he was still holding out anymore. He was going to break apart soon, and there would be no hope of picking up the pieces.

 

Bucky needed him, he couldn't break down. He would definitely need him when he got back from this mission, the nightmares were sure to come back, and Bucky would need him.

 

"Look at me, _m **a** l’chik_ ."

 

He couldn't bring himself to move, and she ended up tilting his face toward her herself, using one little hand and feeling the wetness from his eyes.

 

She was beautiful, lying next to him in the dark, easily seen, thanks to the serum. Maybe he'd save this image in his head and draw it later. Her skin looked smooth and soft, and she made a valiant attempt at a smile when they locked eyes. It didn't work-- her concern had crumpled her expression, and guilt curled up in his usual spot just above his stomach, radiating out from his ears to his toes and making him nauseous.

 

Her hand stayed on his cheek, and it was warm and a little callused from the guns and violence she'd known. It reminded him of Peggy and her mean right hook. She'd been the one to really teach him to fight. Bucky had tried, but he was a brawler. Peggy relied on cunning and agility, not brute strength. Especially after looking at Steve's slight frame and seeing that brute strength was not his particular gift. She had always said that the only way to win was to fight like a girl-- not a girl. A woman. He felt like he thought of that  every time  he looked at Natasha. They would've been thick as thieves.

 

Putting in all his energy, Steve rolled onto his side to face her, ignoring the stars that popped in his vision from the exertion. "Hi."

 

She huffed a disbelieving laugh at that "Hey Steve." She was stroking his cheek now, as the few tears that wouldn't be stopped pooled around his nose and fell to the sheets. "Can I ask you something?" She whispered, but she hesitated like she wasn't sure about it. He frowned, but gave a jerky nod. Every move made him that much more exhausted. "Why do you never draw your face into your sketches?"

 

He didn't really have the words to say it. He knew why, he just didn't know how to... "I..." he opened his mouth, and promptly shut it again with a click of his teeth. How do you tell someone that you can barely remember what you looked like? That the body that should be his became foreign and fragmented when his memories reached his face. And he could be shown a picture or two, but would still be foggy and confused after. Wondering how he had gone from  that  to  this . "This isn't my body, Natasha."

 

And then it was said. She could do with it whatever she saw fit. Because while maybe he wasn't entirely sure of why he could never bring himself to place his face-- his identity-- on the body that used to be his, Steve knew that this one didn't fit. Was this part of combat fatigue? Was he just plain crazy? Was this an identity crisis? He didn't know, but he was so fucking tired of it.

 

Saying it out loud felt so different to just thinking it. He could barely stop the hot tears from overflowing as he finally admitted it. He hated himself. He was lost between worlds. His body had become a prison of overstimulation and perpetual  health \-- nothing meant anything. There was never a permanent consequence or even a scar for getting crushed by a collapsing building on a mission, or jumping fifty stories out of a glass elevator, or putting a fucking plane in the fucking ocean and drowning himself. This body came back. He started at the Battle of New York, just seeing how far he could push before this body would show even a single sign of wear. Going down for a "hero play", as Clint called it, during a battle or mission with the team had always felt natural, but it had started to get scary. Because Steve sometimes found himself wishing that the body wouldn't protect him. Maybe he could beat the serum. If he did, he would definitely die, but at least he would prove to himself that he was still human.

 

Mostly these thoughts had come in before Bucky came home. Steve had something to live for now. But old habits died hard, and if he could protect someone without permanent injury, Steve would always lay himself down as a human shield.

 

Sometimes without thinking about it, sometimes because he was a spiteful, vindictive bastard, he would sabotage the body. Not sleeping, not eating. The flashbacks and dreams didn't make it any easier. The thought of closing his eyes for sleep made Steve's heart clench with terror-- what if he woke up, and another 70 years had passed? What if everyone he had come to love all over again were dead and gone? He would wake from nightmares convinced he was on that goddamn plane, or in the freezing water, or in the bombed out shell of a bar on the worst night of his life. Those were the nights he couldn't stop the crying. And it didn't stop when he was awake. Steve found himself confused and angry, caught between the idea that he still had to ration himself for war, and the dark thought that maybe he could starve himself out of his prison. Steve stopped eating like he should. He forgot to eat. When he had it in front of him, he would barely pick at it.

 

He said one thing out loud, and it all came crashing in-- he was hit with a wall of emotions he hadn't been letting himself acknowledge that he felt and things he didn't know how to handle. Steve fought himself for control, biting into his cheek until he tasted blood, breathing hard against the tears that he still wouldn't let out. He felt like he was having a heart attack, and his fists dug into the sheets until they tore.

 

"Steve, stop it.  Steve . Let go, I'm right here,  _Mal'chik_  .... it's okay, it's okay...." after that his heartbeat was too loud to hear Nat's soft words, and he breathed against the panic seizing his chest, trying to imagine Bucky holding his hand, not Natasha. Bucky, grounding him back to reality and giving him purpose.

 

He wasn't sure how long he did that before he was calm enough to not burst into tears. Steve opened his eyes to see Natasha staring back at him with wide eyes.

 

"I'm so sorry, Steve." She mumbled.

 

"Th-there's nothin' t'be sorry for..." he wanted her to know that. He needed her to know that-- that wasn't her fault. Guilt bit into him again.

 

"You need help, oh my..." she said something in Russian, her hand still over his. She's pried his fingers out of the sheets and the frayed holes he'd made. "We're gonna talk to Sam tomorrow, okay?"

 

Steve would've replied, but he had started to tremble. She shushed him, and when she took him into her arms and held him to her chest, he remembered how Ma had held him when he'd had scarlet fever. And pneumonia. And whooping cough. And all the other things that should have killed him. And then she did it again as she lay dying in the TB ward. She sang in Gaelic under her breath, and stroked his hair like Natasha.

 

She would have known what to do. He still missed his Ma sometimes, so much that it ached.

 

\--------

 

Sam woke up disoriented with a stiff neck. It took him a long moment to take in the suite and recognize that it was Steve's, and remember the evening before.

 

It was barely past 7 am. The sky was a nasty, mottled gray, and rain spattered the floor to ceiling windows. Everything was silent except for the rain, and Sam took a deep breath. He internally scheduled a time to go down to the VA, talk to some friends and counselors down there. He didn't know what his friend needed, and he probably couldn't provide all of it. Steve (and Bucky, when he got back) both needed more help than Sam could give. He knew his limits, and Bucky may have come a long way, but who knows how he'll be feeling when this mission is over.

 

And then there was Steve, who wouldn't even admit there was a problem. Sam knew him damn well. He knew Steve was torturing himself out of guilt, he knew he wasn't sleeping, he knew that whatever was going on with his friend and the shower needed to  stop . But you can't force someone to get help, they need to want it. And it didn't take a genius to see that as long as Bucky was hurting (which would be forever. Sam was a counselor, not a miracle worker. Barnes would always be haunted, but he was coping. Sam just wished Steve would let it be his turn now.) than Steve would deny anything being wrong.

 

It was infuriating and frustrating, watching your best friend fall apart, hurting himself, and denying both the trauma and the pain.

 

Sam went to make coffee, knowing that he'd need a few cups that morning, only to see it had already been brewed. Bewildered, Sam looked around and -- of course, why was he surprised-- Natasha slipped out of Steve's room, fully dressed with a mug in hand.

 

"Morning." He tried a smile, but she had this look fixed on her face that he couldn't quite describe. She was worried, he could tell that much. She mumbled a greeting in Russian as she poured another cup. "How's the patient?"

 

She shook her head, and his heart sank. "Didn't do more than doze. Then he'd wake himself up and squeeze my hand. He asked JARVIS for the date a couple times. He's terrified of sleep, he's terrified to be by himself...  I'm out of my depth. I slept at first, but then...." she took a gulp of coffee that was definitely too hot to be comfortable "I shouldn't have asked him, but he was awake, and didn't seem too distressed."

 

"What did you ask?"

 

"Why he didn't draw his face into his sketches.... he said that  his body wasn't his ." She rubbed at her forehead like she had a headache. Sam's heart sank further. "He barely even cried, he was so focused on holding it all in, I- he.. he's gonna explode, Sam. No wonder he's so easily triggered right now, who knows how long he's been doing this... That's too much for anybody."

 

There was a long silence where Sam tried to put it all together. There had to be something they could do.

 

"Is he awake?"

 

"Well, he's not sleeping. I don't know if awake is the best word for it. I don't think he's moved in four hours."

 

The door to the master suite looked impenetrable from where Sam sat. He took a fortifying sip of coffee, before making his way over to the door.

 

Nat was right. Steve was staring blankly up at the ceiling, completely still, lying on the bed.

 

"Morning." He tried, not expecting a response, and not getting one.

 

"Steve. You in there, Man?" He approached, sitting at the edge of the mattress. "C'mon, let's get up and make some breakfast."

 

Again, nothing. Then, Steve slowly turned his head to look at him. His eyes were big, glassy and far away. Sam's heart clenched painfully, and he took his friend's hand.

 

He'd had plenty of vets look at him like that. Usually in their first weeks home, when they haven't slept more than an hour a night and are just realizing that they need to go into the VA and see Sam. See a counselor. Talk to  anybody  so that they can get some rest before they go crazy.

 

Some of them kept that look, though. The worst days were the ones that the police would come, bring in a picture of one of those faces, and ask Sam questions about them. Next of kin, had they talked about setting their affairs in order, did they seem different than usual. By then, Sam had figured it out.

 

It was hard not to take it as a personal blow when a vet killed his or herself to get out of that vicious cycle. You can't save everybody. But, those days still made Sam feel briefly like his job didn't matter.

 

Looking at Steve, he was starting to feel like his job didn't matter. And this time, it did feel personal, profoundly and viscerally. If he couldn't help his friend, who could he help? How could he force Steve into getting back to himself? He'd settle for him not dying, at this point.

 

"Get up, Steve. We're gonna get something to eat, and I'm gonna watch you eat it." He pulled back the covers, pulling him up to sit. From that point, muttering "okay, okay Sam" under his breath, Steve could take care of the rest. Good.

 

The first few steps were wobbly, even though he tried to hide it. By the time he reached the threshold of the bedroom, however, there was no sign of Steve being less than his Captain America best. It was terrifying. How long had this been happening right under their noses? It was so obvious to Sam now, because he was looking for it-- the 1000 yard stare, the absent fidgeting of his fingers, the hard set of his mouth. Determination and stubbornness.

 

"Hey, you're up." Natasha commented evenly, flicking through another sketchbook (Which Steve didn't seem to notice).

 

"We're gonna make some eggs and bacon-- you in?" Sam volunteered. Steve didn't seem to notice. He was pouring his first coffee of the day, even though the caffeine didn't effect him.

 

"I'm always up to supervise, Wilson."

 

"Yeah, can't let Nat near a stove, you know that."

 

They both stopped and stared blankly. Steve had spoken. He sounded so normal, unless you were really listening for the effort. He looked so normal, all of a sudden, like a fairy godmother had sprinkled him with magic over the course of the three fucking seconds they hadn't paid attention. He gave half a smirk over the rim of his cup that was less convincing, but he was so good at faking it. What ever happened to Captain America being a bad liar?

 

Nat gave a slightly panicked laugh, clearly thinking the same things Sam was "Yeah I'd burn the place down-- I ever tell you about my former safe house in Bornholm?" They rolled with it, Sam grabbing eggs out of the fridge while she grabbed the bread for toast "SHEILD thought it was an assassination attempt, but it was just me, making dinner. Whole place burned to a crisp."

 

They got out the griddle and started cracking eggs. Steve even made a new pot of coffee. Or course, he also drank almost all of it himself, and he was looking pretty pale, but he was moving. Even that was an accomplishment. It was okay-- there was still a lot to discuss but, as his momma used to say: everything on this earth is better done on a full stomach.

 

So, there would be eggs. And bacon. And toast and coffee. And soon they were all sat at the island with heaping plates-- except Steve. Dry toast and coffee. His eggs were already going cold.

 

"You better eat that, Rogers." He said through a mouthful of food. "When was the last time you ate?"

 

"Haven't been too hungry, Sammy."

 

That was bullshit. "Gotcha." There was a beat of silence while Sam tried to figure out the best way to approach this-- Steve was so angry, even when it didn't look like it, it was so easy to piss him off. He was bubbling just under the surface, and Sam didn't want him to shut down again. "Just try to eat some, Steve, your body needs fuel."

 

That didn't seem to help. Steve went a ghostly color, flinching away a tiny bit from his plate. Like most things about Steve, it would have been easy to miss if Sam wasn't already on high alert.

 

"We just want you to stay healthy, Steve, you need to eat something." Natasha said softly, gently. "Steve, it's not--"

 

"Would you stop handlin' me? I'm not gonna crack up!" He burst out. His accent was a little thicker in his voice (everyone always forgot Steve had one, until Bucky came back, and it started sinking back into his voice). Nat's mouth shut with a click, and Steve seemed to suddenly realize what he had said. "I'm goin' back to bed, I'm tired..."

 

He looked flushed and out of breath, and they should have seen it coming. If it was anyone else, Sam, at least, would have seen it a mile away. You can't eat that little on such a high metabolism, and get that little sleep, without eventually shutting down. But neither of them saw it coming as their friend went to stand from his chair, trembling and ashy, and promptly crumpled to the floor. His eyes rolled back, completely unconscious. Both of them called something out, but Sam didn't know what they thought that could possibly accomplish.

 

Steve had passed out on the floor, and Sam hurried to check his pulse, his own heart hammering in his chest.

 

"I'm calling Bruce." Nat called. Sam was then in charge of Steve. His heartbeat was fast and hard, and he still seemed to tremble a little, but maybe that was Sam's hands making him feel that. He tapped Steve's face, shook him by the shoulders, and he got  nothing . Steve was ghostly white, and the dark circles under his eyes finally revealed themselves to be dark and deep. His lips were bitten raw and at several different stages of healing. He'd been doing this for so long: burning himself up in the shower, staying awake all night, running himself into the ground.  He didn't feel like his body was his .

 

Sam had helped so many vets, he had even helped Bucky fucking Barnes, world's longest held POW. He had been through Hell himself. Looking down at Steve's bloodless face, though, he didn't even know where to start.

 

"Banner's on his way down-- I told him to come alone, but I heard Stark in the background, so we might have some company anyway." Natasha filled him in.

 

There was a beat of silence where they both looked at each other and acknowledged how out of their minds with worry they were. Then, they shoved it down and focused. Like a battle.

 

"Help me move him?"

 

"I'll grab his legs."

 

Steve was much lighter than he should have been, and Sam's stomach did a flip around his eggs and bacon. They laid Steve on the bed. Sam grabbed the overstuffed armchair from the window and pulled it over.

 

That was when Bruce arrived, Tony and Clint on his heels like a couple of puppies.

 

"Holy shit." He dropped his bag on the armchair as he immediately went down to check Steve's breathing and pulse. "Fill me in, what happened?"

 

Sam took the lead on that. Nat was looking steadfastly and pointedly not shaken, but she was holding Steve's hand so tight his fingers might pop off, so Sam let her be. He told Banner everything they had seen and heard since they had gone down to get him for dinner the night before (it seemed like ages ago now). Even Stark was silent while Sam talked.

 

Bruce took a deep breath and nodded sagely "Okay... Well, let's get him down to the med floor and hook him up to some fluids. His vitals are okay, but his heart's a little fast--"

 

"Is he sick?"

 

"Our fearless leader? He can't get sick, birdbrain. Serum's suppose to keep him in tip top shape." Tony jabbed at Clint, with less conviction or heat than usual. Everyone was staring at Steve, varying degrees of dumbfounded and afraid.

 

"Maybe we shouldn't take him down," Sam found himself saying "waking up in a different place might scare him."

 

Bruce nodded "Lifting him is no easy feat either, I'm sure."

 

"Actually it was too easy." Nat chimed in, looking grave "He's much lighter than you'd think."

 

There was a beat of silence, then. Bruce bit the inside of his cheek, thinking. Clint made his way over to where Nat was sitting on the bed by Steve's side. Tony still stood by the door, uncharacteristically quiet. Of course, however, he was the first one to speak.

 

"JARVIS?"

 

" Yes, Master Stark ?"

 

"Run diagnostic on The Good Captain, here."

 

There was another moment of quiet, and a beam of blue light that came from...  somewhere  on the ceiling or walls, Sam didn't know, and slid up and down Steve's body a few times. Bruce rolled his eyes.

 

" Steven Grant Rogers, born July 4th, 1918. Age: 97 or 31 years. Height: 6'2". Weight: 185 lbs. Suffering malnutrition and severe exhaustion. "

 

"Thanks for out-doctoring me, J." Bruce commented wryly, even as he was sitting down beside their patient.

 

"JARVIS is a good doctor... for basics, anyway. Couldn't do any actual treating, but he used to look after me pretty well in my darker moments." Tony remarked nonchalantly "No one out-doctors you, my Jolly Green Giant."

 

"Could we focus more on the fact that Steve is, like,  30 lbs  underweight?" Clint broke up the bro-fest, and Sam decided yet again, that he liked Barton. "Isn't he supposed to maintain a certain  everything ? Never changing unless injured in battle? Steve is  always fine ."

 

"That thinking's what let it get this far, I think." Sam heard himself speaking up "I mean, did any of us really look or ask until it was too late?"

 

"Stop saying that." Nat whispered.

 

"It's true." Self hatred reared up, all mean and ugly in his chest, the likes of which he hadn't felt since Riley's death.

 

185  lbs.

 

"Well, Doctor-- your professional opinion?" Stark needled Banner, who was frowning at Steve's slack mouth and gray, lifeless skin.

 

He shook his head almost mournfully "I'd say he overburdened the serum." He checked for a fever, but apparently was having trouble feeling with just his hand, grabbing his thermometer out of his bag "If he's not sleeping, I mean, it sounds terrible, but that's fine. The serum will keep him up and going for up to a week without rest-- although it's not recommended. But if he's not eating, the serum has no stores of energy. He has no way to heal himself without feeding his metabolism, which is staying the same, so..."

 

"You can starve out the serum?" Nat questioned, speaking quietly like Steve would wake up at any minute, even though there was next to no chance of that happening any time soon.

 

"I guess, yeah." Bruce nodded "I had hypothesized it in some of my first writings about the logistics of a superserum, but that's not something I would have ever asked Steve to test..." he wiped a hand down his face "Alright, I need an IV drip. And maybe a nutrient drip, I.... Yeah, a nutrient drip, too. JARVIS?"

 

"Yes, Dr. Banner ."

 

"Monitor breathing and heart rate. Inform me if it stays elevated longer than ten minutes and doesn't return to normal." Bruce fumbled in his bag before taking out a needle and blood vial. It wasn't until he was tying off Steve's arm that Sam realized what he was doing, and despite all the blood he'd spilt and seen in his life, he could barely watch as a trickle of red pumped into the glass.

 

Bruce and the others were talking about something, but Sam couldn't hear anymore. He just stared, taking in his friend looking smaller and younger than he'd ever seen him. He supposed that was the point. His body didn't feel like his own. Sam had only ever seen one picture of Steve before the serum, but he knew that all the weight and height and health he gained in those few minutes probably fucked him up pretty good. It seemed so plain and logical now, Sam couldn't imagine why he, or anybody else, had considered the idea that the serum wasn't as perfect as they thought. It made you physically healthy, but what about the rest?

 

Like his legs couldn't hold him anymore, Sam dropped into the armchair as Bruce moved away to get everything set up. To run tests. Tears blurred his vision and Sam didn't bother to stop them.

 

\--------

 

Clint was used to being an observer. Sometimes he just took out his hearing aids and watched the world go by. He used to curse his hearing loss, but now it felt like more of a gift. He had the luxury of unplugging himself. It helped, to be able to put a degree of separation between him and whatever horrible godawful thing that was happening. Like Captain America collapsing under all the stress he was saddled to. Bruce and Sam kept throwing around the phrase "eating disorder". Steve hadn't felt like he could talk to any of them. Not a single one, not even Sam (which was obviously bothering him).

 

This time, Clint kept his ears on. The oppressive guilt and worry permeating the whole fucking suite wasn't something anything could dim. Taking out his aids just meant being out of the loop if anything happened.

 

It had been a day and a half, and everyone was staking out Steve's floor of the Tower. He had a few guest rooms and a comfortable couch, but they didn't do much sleeping. Sam hadn't moved from that big chair since he sat down in it. Tony had started calling Steve "Sleeping Beauty", pacing around the floor and asking JARVIS for updates as if Steve wasn't right in the next room over. He couldn't look at him. Bruce was up and down from the med floor. Natasha hadn't slept, which made his heart ache. She sat in the guest room that Steve had made into a studio and looked through endless paintings and sketches.

 

They knew now that Bucky was in Patagonia-- Tony hacked the file in hopes that it would say when he'd be returning. Steve needed him. It didn't say anything about it.

 

So, all they could do was wait. Bruce was meticulous about checking dosages of the nutrients being let in to Steve's drip bag. He poured over new calculations every hour of how best to adjust it for Steve's enhancements, collaborating with JARVIS and Tony. Steve hadn't moved a muscle.

 

Until just past noon that day, about 30 hours of the team being in the suite, when JARVIS interrupted the quiet routine of lunch making (with combined ingredients from each of their floors, since Steve's kitchen was just about completely, dishearteningly empty). " Dr. Banner, The Captain's blood pressure, as well as his heart rate, has increased substantially over the past 10 minutes and 23 seconds ."

 

Bruce's sandwich was abandoned in less than a second, and he was on his way to the master bedroom.

 

"He's having a nightmare." Sam filled them in as they all burst in.

 

"No seizing or anything?" Bruce questioned, pressing his fingers to Steve's wrist and starting to count.

 

"Man, you think I wouldn't notice if he was?"

 

Bruce shrugged noncommittally, continuing to count "Maybe we can get him to wake up-- as long as he's awake, things are getting better:"

 

Steve's face had been smooth and serene with sleep since the moment Clint had been there. Now, it was creased between his brows and he was shaking like a leaf. Every muscle was tight and Steve had to be well and truly terrified, chest heaving and breathing hard. It was hard to watch. Bruce leaned forward, apparently satisfied with Steve's racing heart and grabbed his shoulders.

 

"Steve, are you there?" He shook him as gently as he could "Steve, it's Bruce-- wherever you are, it's not real. We need you to wake up."

 

No response.

 

Bruce jostled him harder, repeating himself. Steve's face was all screwed up in pain now, and Clint felt his heart twist for the guy. Even unconscious, he seemed to be shying away from the touch, like it burned. He whimpered-- it was so easy to forget that this was  Captain America  they were looking at. Steve looked small and young and Clint still couldn't believe he was only 31 years old. Compared to Clint-- compared to most of them-- Steve was just a baby.

 

He was hyperventilating, ragged breaths filling the air as everyone tried their best to wake their friend from his deep sleep. What felt like hours was, in actuality, probably more like 5 minutes, but it still killed them all to watch. In one of the moments that he just couldn't look, Clint looked up to see Nat following Steve's every exhale, unshed tears in her eyes. Clint took her hand.

 

And then he just stopped breathing. Sam gripped his hand, holding tight while Bruce tried to wake him up without hurting him.

 

Nearly a full minute passed with Steve turning blue, before he finally gasped in a huge breath like a drowning man. Oh. Clint's entire chest ached with that realization. 

 

His eyes were open, but he didn't seem to see any of them, and he cried out as he desperately wriggled out of Bruce and Sam's grips. Steve made a horrible whining sound, like he was trying not to scream. With nearly uncontrollably shaking fingers, he ripped out the IV, making a thin spatter of blood across his sheets. He didn't stop there, though, continuing to scratch and dig at his skin with these pitiful, pained noises.

 

"Steve? Steve, it's 2015-- you're gonna be okay, I know it's scary, I know. But you're gonna be okay..." Sam started a soothing rumble of words, trying to combat the clear threat that Steve's half awake self saw in all of them. He slammed his fingers down over his ears, eyes scrunched up in the daylight. Sam yelled to JARVIS to dim the windows. Steve was shaking and nearly screaming, and Clint wanted to turn off his aids. It was a terrible sound. Sam desperately tried to hold him down when Steve broke the skin of his arms, drawing thin trails of blood all across the sheets, skin all under his short, blunt nails. "You're hurting yourself, Steve, man... please, please stop. It's okay...."

 

But Steve only seemed to be getting worse, pulling at his clothes and skin and the sheets, even his hair. He shouted and whimpered and growled in whatever agony he was in, and Clint was out of his depth from day one with this guy, but now? Now, he was practically on a different planet.

 

"Steve?! What the Hell is this?" Bucky was at the door, striding in with purpose, and Clint had never been so relieved and so nervous at the same time. They didn't know what Barnes knew, or what state he would come back from his mission in.

 

He was out of his Kevlar, clean and in his civvies. He shoved Bruce and Sam both out of the way where they were trying to hold Steve down. He checked Steve over for any kind of injury, and found just a bunch of scratches. He looked profoundly sad, just watching for a sec as Steve scratched and tore at his skin, making these sad, distressed little noises. Then, Bucky seemed to know just what to do, and started to reach out so gently. Steve hadn't really noticed him yet. He didn't know where he was, that was for sure.

 

"Stevie, Steve.. Baby, it's 2015. It's me, it's Buck...." he managed to get his hands over the other man's and Steve screamed in pain before cutting himself off, meeting Barnes's eyes with his wild blue ones.

 

"B-Buck...?" He whimpered, still shaking and rocking back and forth nervously.

 

"Yeah, Doll. I'm right here. Today is November 5th, 2015. You're in Stark Tower--" Tony muttered "Avengers Tower" under his breath, but thank god Steve didn't seem to hear him. He hadn't acknowledged their presence yet. "And I just got back from a  horrible  mission... I missed you, Baby. This's really gettin' outta hand, why'd you never tell me it was this bad? Why did you never say?"

 

Steve didn't answer, just mumbled his name over and over, like a prayer. By this time, most of the team had noticed that they were intruding on something private, but none of them went to move away or leave the room at all. Clint wasn't going anywhere until he saw Steve doing better, and he was willing to bet so was everyone else. They were all ashy and pale faced, staring at the two soldiers on the bed, absolutely dumbfounded. None of them had realized just how much Steve was hurting.

 

And the part that really sucked was that they definitely would've figured it out if they had bothered to ask. They had all seen the signs. They just didn't know the extent of it all. Even Bucky didn't know all of it, apparently, as he moved around the big bed to sit down with Steve (still trembling and scratching at himself absently) at the headboard.

 

"Why didn't you say, huh Baby?" He mumbled "Is it okay if I hold you? Will that hurt your skin too much?"

 

Steve choked on a sob, holding it in, and wasn't that just the whole problem in a nutshell. The whole thing, honestly, hurt to look at. But Clint knew he couldn't look away, just like everybody else.

 

"Cry, man." Sam said, finally drawing attention to them all there "Let this out, you're gonna explode if you don't...." he went to grip his friend's shoulder, but thought better of it, settling for a reassuring smile as Steve looked over at him and seemed to realize them all there.

 

The look on his flushed, exhausted face said it all. Clint wanted to say that it didn't hurt, seeing Steve look at all of them and realizing what he'd shown them. He was so  embarrassed . A dark blush bloomed all the way down to his chest, and he cataloged each of their faces before looking down like he could never meet their eyes again.

 

And Clint just couldn't have that. Didn't Steve know that they were his friends? That they loved him, and they would've dropped anything to help sooner if they'd known?

 

His big blue eyes looked like a child's when they flooded with tears, then. And, miraculously, Steve let them fall. By the time he noticed just how hard they were coming and that they were not stopping, he started to sob. Bucky wasted no time in guiding him down onto his chest and wrapping him up in his mismatched arms. And Steve cried and cried, tears soaking into Bucky's T shirt and sobs wracking his body like tremors for what felt like hours, until he fell back to a doze, cradled close. There was nothing in the world that would make Barnes move right then.

 

Once Steve was safely tucked up against him, Bucky looked around the room at each of them. For answers, Clint realized belatedly.

 

"I don't know what you're doing with those puppy eyes, RoboCop, you seem to know more than us." Tony, of course, was the one to break the silence.

 

"Well, how about  that  thing?" He pointed with half a hand at the IV stand, absently stroking Steve's blonde hair away from his face.

 

"How'd you not notice that he wasn't eating anything? He's lost 25 lbs." Tony said it mechanically, but, as much as he liked Barnes, he was getting mad now, and Bucky could tell that much.

 

"How'd I not notice? I did notice, but apparently I'm the only one. Who knows what he was eating before I came back. I get him to eat at least a little something when I'm around, but you can't force a grown man to do anything. Especially not Steve, the stubbornest man on Earth." Steve shifted, and Bucky shushed him quietly, holding him a little tighter.

 

"We aren't accusing you of anything. But can you tell us what you know?" Nat diffused the situation, and Clint shot Stark a glare. A "shut up and don't be stupid" type of glare. Tony seemed unaffected, but he shut up, just looked at Steve like his entire world had shifted. Now that Clint thought about it, it had. His had, too. They all had thought Steve was fine, that he was Captain America, what could be wrong? The serum made everything better, the serum saved him from the brink of death on just about every mission Steve nearly died on (which were many). The serum, apparently, had actually fucked him up as much as it helped him, according to Bucky.

 

"After Erskine, when Steve saved me from Azzano, I started noticing these little ticks. Steve was fidgety, and I wouldn't've thought much of it, but I wasn't sleeping much and we shared a tent while on the missions with the Howlies. Steve would wake up unable to breathe, saying everything was so fucking loud, he couldn't get the smell a' blood an' gunpowder outta his nose, his skin was too tight, he couldn't sleep. I had been having my own panic attacks, so I would do my best to talk him down. We worked out a system, and figured out certain things that helped." He cleared his throat "Some things helped more than others, but Stevie needed to feel small again. His body might be big and strong now, but he's still got the same mind. When he gets panic attacks, or has had a really long day sometimes, it's just too much input. Lights, sounds, the sensation of clothes is even too much sometimes. He can feel every thread. My Stevie was half deaf and colorblind before the serum, so when he flashes back or wakes up not knowing where he is, his memories get all jumbled up. That's what I think, at least. Steve's never really been able to put it into words for me. And since I came to live here, it didn't seem like it was happenin' much anymore. He had nightmares, panic attacks, and yeah, I knew he wasn't eating too well. There was a morning, right about a month ago, where Steve had a similar attack to today's, though. That's why I know what to do... We've had the fight about a million times, about him tellin' you guys, seeing Sam for sessions,  anything . But, he wouldn't do it, and the attacks kept coming. They were pretty standard, except for him near boiling himself in the shower a couple times. I started joining him so I had control over the temperature, and I could get him to eat some of what I was eating pretty regularly."

 

"That's why you've been pushing those dietary restrictions I gave you." Bruce spoke up, looking pinched "You've been trying to get more food in him."

 

"Don't need to be a doctor to know a super soldier can't live on dry toast, oatmeal, and soup. Stevie was dropping weight, even though, with the serum you can't really tell by lookin'." Barnes kept throwing glances at that IV, bloody needle dangling uselessly. "So, what happened?"

 

It came down to Sam and Natasha. They traded between different parts-- Nat staying with Steve during the night two nights ago, Sam getting him out of bed. Bucky looked ashen by the time they got to Steve passing out on the kitchen floor, gripping the man tight in his arms and clenching his jaw. He was  pissed, and scared shitless . At Steve, at the situation, at himself. Clint could see it-- he and Barnes had gotten to be pretty good friends in the time since he'd come to the Tower, and he knew that was the "pissed at Steve" look.

 

"Do we know why he did it?" He said in a low, lethal voice. He was still petting Steve's hair, but it seemed to be more about proving to himself that Steve was still alive and there with him, then comforting a man who was already asleep.

 

Sam shrugged. "He was talking about how his body didn't feel like his. And the man's got survivor's guilt up to his eyeballs. It could be a hundred different things. Bruce and I'll both be chatting with him when he wakes up, I'm sure you'll want to be there." Bucky nodded, and Sam gave him a tight smile.

 

Today was probably more words than Barnes had spoken since he arrived, and it showed on his pale, tired face. There was a beat of silence where all that was heard was Steve's soft breathing, looking so young and small against Bucky's chest in the gigantic bed (Tony had gotten one for all of them. Clint didn't bother taking it back, he just slept in the guest room.).

 

"You said the mission was horrible?" Clint spoke up, wanting to get in that one question before they went back to their own floors and this chapter finally came to a close. Bucky's eyes were drifting a little, more tired than he'd been recently. He had a Hell of a road ahead of him-- they all did. They would all be there for Steve while he recovered.

 

Bucky shrugged "It was terrible to be away from him. I think I slept maybe eight hours total for the whole trip. Everything went okay. Definitely not something I'll be doing again, though. Only for Steve." He got cut off by his own yawn, resting his cheek on the top of Steve's hair. Steve made a pleased little huffing noise in his sleep and Bucky smiled softly. "You guys should go. He's hopefully gonna sleep a bit longer, and I'd like to get a couple hours in before we talk...."

 

And so, they left. One by one, the Avengers filed out of the master suite, until just a few remained. Clint clapped Bucky on the shoulder, stealing one last glance at Steve. "Sorry, man. We should've taken better care of him."

 

Bucky nodded. "He'll be okay. That's what matters."

 

It wasn't "it's okay". Clint actually found that he would've been dissatisfied if it had been. Because then Bucky would be lying. Steve had just about completely disappeared for three full days, and none of them thought to much about it. They wanted to see if Steve had grown with Bucky's return. But it turned out that he was only okay with Bucky around. Clint's insides twisted up again, and he gave Barnes a tight smile, throwing "Sweet dreams" over his shoulder as he left the suite.

 

Nat slipped her hand into his and squeezed as they boarded the elevator home. "Bruce is staying to take some more blood, and Bucky asked Sam to stay..."

 

He nodded blandly, suddenly awfully tired himself. It wasn't until they were tucked into bed, Natasha's chest pressed up against his back, that he realized he wouldn't be able to sleep until he said it out loud.

 

"How'd we miss it?"

 

"Hm?"

 

"Steve's..  issues . How did we not see it from the minute he came home after D.C. and that crazy search for Bucky? Or, Hell, right when we met him on that hellicarrier? All that he's been through--  famously  been through. And it took him passing out for almost two full days for us to give a shit!"

 

She ran her fingertips along the dip of his sternum and abs, waiting patiently for him to finish, and he would've been thinking something about how much he loved her if he wasn't so pissed at himself, at all of them.

 

"We are all.. so fucked up, Barton." She sighed and it was warm against his neck "We didn't want to see it. You walk into a place like this, where everyone has their demons and you know it. But, you look up to them, and they all seem so strong and good and righteous. You admire them and they must be doing okay or they wouldn't be so strong and good. So, you overlook those little tells, because if they aren't okay, then what does that make you?" She kissed the back of his neck while that sank in. "We all admire Steve. So we overlooked the little things. That's what I did, anyway."

 

There was a moment of silence. She was right.

 

"Jesus, Tasha. How'd you get so fuckin' wise?" He huffed a laugh. Something was lighter in his chest, and he craned his neck back to kiss her.

 

She rolled her eyes "Go to sleep, moron."

 

\----------

 

Bruce stayed to take a vial of blood from Steve's arm, some shit about maintaining blood sugar and levels of something or other.

 

Sam stayed just because he needed someone to talk to. About Steve being an asshole and breaking his promise and hiding shit from him. About hearing Pierce in his head on the mission, and the shame of being happy to shoot again. That gun felt so right, and he hated himself for it.

 

Steve slept peacefully on, for the most part. A couple times he'd whimper and tremble, or shift around in his sleep, but all Bucky needed to do was shush him gently, kiss his forehead and stroke his hair. It reminded him of a thousand different times that his small little Stevie would end up cradled in his arms in their tiny bed with some fever dream. It was actually very calming, to sit with Steve curled up so close, although he wished it was under better circumstances. If he couldn't come back to a healthy, happy Steve, though-- he hated to admit-- a Steve in need to care was the next best thing to come home to. Taking care of him was Bucky's primary source of therapy, long before he started talking to Sam, long before HYDRA and the War. The soft blonde hair between his fingers hadn't changed, the bones under all that newer muscle were the same bones. That brain was the same stupidly smart, fucking stubborn, self sacrificing brain it always had been.

 

25 lbs down. Malnutrition and exhaustion. Had he eaten at all while Bucky was gone? Had he slept? Bucky knew there had been nothing he could do short of force feeding him, or knocking him out to make him sleep, and he had already shoved his way into Steve's showers every morning. But it still felt wrong to have done as little as he had.

 

Sam left at some point so Bucky could join Steve and finally sleep. He helped him resettle Steve back down on the bed so Bucky wouldn't wake up with a stiff back from sleeping against the headboard. Then it was just the two of them, like always.Steve was pressed back into his side as soon as Bucky was horizontal, murmuring in his sleep "dn't go, please dn't...."

 

Bucky's entire body radiated with shame and worry right out to his fingers and toes, and he wrapped Steve up so tight he was sure it would be uncomfortable for anyone else "I'm not ever gonna leave you alone again... I'm right here, Stevie." Never again, he meant it.

 

They fell asleep that way, with their legs tangled together and whole bodies pressed flush.

 

The next time Bucky woke, Steve was already awake and staring over at the leftover IV stand. The only physical reminder that anything had even happened. Bucky reached over and stroked his thigh, letting him know he wasn't alone.

 

"Hey Buck" his voice was hoarse from crying and sleep. "Love you...."Bucky picked himself up to sit beside him, unsure of where to start.

 

"You're not gettin' outta this one that easy, Rogers." He said, only half joking.

 

Steve gave a tiny nod "Not tryin' to. Just wanted to say it..." he tangled his fingers with Bucky's metal ones. That never failed to amaze him, and Steve knew it. He'd hated that arm so much, for so long, and Steve would just casually touch it, hold it, even kiss it sometimes. He said it was because every part of Bucky was worthy of love, and it had taken a long time for him to even start to believe him.

 

Then he realized what Steve was doing-- he was checking in. Making sure the mission didn't derail his recovery. Making sure he still knew he was loved, and something big and warm swelled in him. He  loved  Steve. "How was the mission?"

 

"Fine. No major malfunctions. I'm cleared for duty: there's no escaping me now, I'm always gonna be on your six."

 

Steve huffed what was supposed to be a laugh, but just sounded tired instead. He turned away, readjusting to face Bucky straight on, still gripping the fingers of his metal hand.

 

"I'm sorry."

 

He shook his head. "Why didn't you say anything? Why didn't you tell me how bad things were?" Steve's eyes were so big and blue. If you looked close, you could see the few little freckles dusted over his nose that became thousands in the summer sun. Bucky's heart hurt, and he tightened his metal fingers around Steve's."Steve, Sam says you have an eating disorder? And  body dysmorphic disorder? I didn't even know what that meant until he explained it, but, Steve--"

 

"You were still struggling, Buck, I didn't want to jeopardize your recovery--"

 

"Bullshit-- that's not all of it." He wasn't mad, but goddamn Steve could push his buttons. Why'd he have to be so fucking self sacrificing? So concerned for Bucky that he'd hide something this dangerous. He'd been unconscious for over 30 hours. He'd starved out the serum. Bucky didn't want to cry-- his throat was dry, his eyes burned and his vision started to swim, goddamn it. This wasn't supposed to be about him.

 

"Oh Buck, stop it. Don't cry, please, I'm so sorry, I--" he scooted up close and cupped his face, but it wasn't enough. Bucky reached out and pulled Steve in from that tiny waist, and damn, he really was lighter. Bucky's stomach did a flip, but he just pulled Steve in until they couldn't get any closer.

 

Steve was crying now, straddling Bucky's lap with his legs locked around his back and his hands still cupping Bucky's face. He couldn't stand to be that close without it, so he leaned in the last tiny bit, pressing his lips to Steve's.

 

It was like igniting a fire, and it spread through both of them, their whole bodies. It had been five days since Bucky had been able to kiss his fella, hold him, touch him. Their tears mingled, and they barely breathed, too busy trying to swallow each other whole.

 

It didn't last too long. Bucky wanted to be inside him, he wanted it so bad. But it wasn't the right time. Steve was delicate right then. There would be time later. They had the whole rest of their lives to make love and stay up late watching old movies and make pancakes in the mornings. Right now was when the talking had to happen, or it never would.

 

So, he pulled away just a little, petting the short hair on the back of Steve's head as he pressed sloppy, desperate kisses down Bucky's neck.

 

"Stevie." Steve whined in the back of his throat, grinding into Bucky's lap. Buț he was trembling again, and Bucky just couldnt have that. "Steve, baby stop. Stop it."

 

"What's wrong? Did I scare you? Are you hurting?" He asked, immediately assuming that it was Bucky who needed the time to breathe. For the longest time, it had been. When he'd first come home. But, Bucky was doing pretty okay now, and it was time to return the favor.

 

"Nah, I'm okay, Baby." He said "You're shakin' like a leaf. And you never answered my question." Steve looked at him blankly "Why didn't you get help? Aside from worrying about my sorry ass.."

 

There was a long moment of silence where Steve looked like he was searching for a lie, but Bucky just raised an eyebrow and he slumped back into his arms, finally surrendering to his own health. His own humanity. Even before he got all big and strong, Stevie had had trouble with letting himself be human. Allowing himself to fail was never an option. And the serum only seemed to accentuate that.

 

Steve pressed his forehead into the side of Bucky's neck, fisting one hand in his soft T shirt. He nuzzled in there, and just breathed for a minute. Bucky let him. He would always let Steve take his time.

 

"I didn't want anyone thinkin' I was ungrateful.."

 

That was hardly what he was expecting. Given, Bucky hadn't really known what to expect but... "What?"

 

"I didn't want people thinking I was ungrateful. The serum gave me a chance at a healthy life. I was given a chance to be strong, and handsome, and then to get to experience this strange future... it's strange. But it's amazing. I've been gifted with so many incredible things, Buck. Who am I to be seeking help when I'm supposed to be the one providing it an' giving back? I--"

 

His breath caught, and he started to cry again. Really cry, with shuddering inhales and harsh sobs. He needed it. Steve needed to finally let this out. He let him cry himself out, until he was just catching his breath against Bucky's collarbone. He rubbed long strokes across his back, shushing him gently and murmuring sweet little things.

 

"I've got one more question, Stevie. And then we're gonna take a shower at a reasonable temperature for reasonable length of time, and get back into bed and get some real sleep. Okay?"

 

Steve nodded, not moving from his place cradled against Bucky.

 

"Okay. How long have you been doing this? The not sleeping and the s-starving?"

 

"It's hard to say." Steve murmured after a moment of tense silence. "From when I was defrosted I couldn't sleep more than a couple hours at a time. It got worse the longer I was here, though. The more connections I made. I couldn't afford to fall asleep and maybe wake up in another century, lose all those people all over again. Natasha, and Sam, and everybody." He trembled more, clutching at Bucky's waist so hard that it hurt, but he didn't tell him to stop. "I don't know when the eating thing became intentional, though. I forgot a lot ever since I woke up. But after a while... it became something more." His voice was so small by the time he finished, Bucky barely recognized his voice. He was crying again, and it all just seemed so vast. Three and a half years, Steve had been doing this. All alone, scared and completely believing that he had no right to feel it. It broke his heart.

 

"I'm gonna take care of you again, Baby." He whispered "I promise. You're gonna get better..."

 

Steve huffed out a sigh, but he burrowed into Bucky's arms impossibly closer. "I missed that."

 

"Missed what?"

 

"Being taken care of. You know how bad I am at it."

 

"That's why I'm here, Sweetheart." He shoved the sheets off of the both of them then, manhandling Steve to stand with him "Let's get you washed up, huh? You stink, Rogers." And he took his hand, leading him into the bathroom.

 

There were ripped clothes on the dark tile floor. Steve's. Bucky took a deep breath, willing himself away from the pull in his gut that was asking him how the Hell he hadn't noticed how bad it was. Steve was ripping apart his clothes just to get his fix.

 

Maybe a shower wasn't a great idea.

 

But, Steve was already standing in the center of the bath mat, already slipping out of the old sweats and tank top that he'd been wearing when he'd passed out. He looked a little greasy, a little skinny (not nearly as skinny as he would look without the serum to beef him up, though) and more than a little rattled by the whole ordeal of the past couple days. Washing it all away always made Bucky feel better. And he wouldn't let Steve hurt himself. Not anymore.

 

Bucky started the water, getting it to a comfortable temperature. He stepped in first, and held out a hand for Steve to step into his arms. He was entirely unwilling to be more than a foot or two away from him at any given time, which didn't bother Bucky in the least. They took their time, shampooing each other, soaping each other down with wandering hands, and yeah, maybe Bucky gave in and took Steve in hand, stroking him with gentle, but firm pulls on his cock until he was gasping into his shoulder, his own hand working Bucky over. Bucky murmured sweet little words, looking into those sweet blue eyes. Goddamn it, he was never gonna let him get hurt, not if there was something Bucky could do about it. His heart pounded in his chest and pleasure pooled low in his hips. Stevie was making those sweet little noises he liked, staring up at him like he was someone to be revered. Someone worthy of love. Bucky came thinking about that, pulling Steve with him with growled promise in his ear and kisses all across his face and neck and shoulders.

 

Steve couldn't hold himself up afterward, the exertion was too much. Bucky rinsed them both, Steve tucked under his metal arm, before turning off the spray and rubbing them both down with a fluffy, fresh towel. Steve hummed appreciatively, and Bucky helped him into fresh sweats from the drawer by the towels, grabbing a pair for himself as well.

 

He was more than ready for bed, and he was practically carrying Steve, so hopefully it would be easy for him to drop off too.

 

Bucky used to hate this bed. The California king mattress was bigger than the whole kitchen at his and Steve's old apartment. But he'd grown to appreciate it. He liked soft things now, the softer and warmer the better. It reminded him that he was home. Steve still struggled with the softness, but looking at him now, you'd have thought he'd picked the damn mattress out himself. His eyes already closed, Steve stretched and curled up under the thickest blanket, making room for Bucky beside him.

 

"You'll wake me up if you need me. For any reason." Bucky said. It wasn't a request, and tired as he was, Steve processed it.

 

"Uh huh.... love you, Buck."

 

"I love you, Stevie."

 

They were both asleep within minutes.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow. Hi. It's been a long time. Thank you for so many kind and encouraging comments, I'm sorry I couldn't get this up for you sooner. The ideas were just not flowing, but I think I've finally got it! As always, if you want to see more, drop me a comment!
> 
> A few things:  
> This chapter is a bit more in depth with Steve's food issues-- more descriptive. If you might be triggered by that, please take the necessary precautions to keep yourself healthy and happy. 
> 
> I do not like Tony Stark. Well, I don't hate the guy, but he's definitely not in my top three (or even five) favorite Marvel characters, and I can find him hard to write. I did my best, though, to keep him in character. I'm not here to bash any characters. And that goes for Nick Fury, as well. 
> 
> I'm going to do one more chapter after this-- maybe an epilogue if I'm feeling ambitious and not drowning in schoolwork. Things will get better, I only operate with happy endings. But, this chapter is SAD. Sorry. 
> 
> I hope this is good-- it doesn't flow for me like the other one did. But, I really wanted to get it done for you guys, and I think I've just read it too many times to really like it anymore. Sorry for any spelling/grammar errors!

At first, he wasn't quite sure where he was. 

 

Panic seized his chest and he bolted upright, looking for the exits, looking for a sign, some type of familiarity. Had he done it again? What year was it? His lungs painfully expanded and contracted in his chest as he sucked in air. Was this asthma? Was he small? 

 

His eyes darted down to take in his body, flexing his hands. His gigantic, trembling hands. The familiar sensation of itching spread through his veins, a thousand ants crawling just under his skin. He felt like his skin had been vacuum sealed over the course of a second. Where was he? What year was it? He couldn't speak, couldn't ask JARVIS, couldn't call for help. Was JARVIS even there? Would anyone come?

 

"Steve!" 

 

There was a hot, smooth pressure against his back-- someone was touching him. It burned against his skin, and Steve knew he must've cried out, but he couldn't hear himself. Was he still screaming? He was definitely crying, he could barely see in the dark of the room-- bedroom? There were huge windows, tiny lights flickering far away. Far down below. 

 

"--re you with me, Stevie? Its just me, it's Buck." 

 

Buck. Bucky. The world around him started to piece itself back together, little by little. The crawling feeling under his skin slowly started to recede, and his lungs started to loosen up again. Steve was still screaming, his throat felt hoarse. The hand on his back hadn't moved, rubbing up and down, and it felt like sandpaper against his spine, but it was worth it. It felt grounding, now. Steve was so grateful he could cry (but he was already crying, so he just cried harder). The hand was smooth and there were little grooves in it. His metal arm-- it was Bucky, and he was home in 2015, and--

 

There was an IV pole on Steve's side of the bed. Oh. 

 

The events of the past day slammed into him, and suddenly he was freezing cold. Blotches of embarrassed heat bloomed in his cheeks and down his chest, but everywhere else remained frozen. What was it that Tony liked to call him? Capsicle? He sure did feel like it, like he'd never be fully warm again. He swallowed the next sob, biting down on his lip and willing himself under control. Bucky was rubbing his back, whispering a soothing little mantra of "it's okay, I'm here. It's 2015, and I'm right here..." he sounded so warm and gentle. But his heart was pounding, he could hear it. Bucky was distressed. That was Steve's fault. 

 

He was so ashamed. He remembered the looks on all their faces as they'd watched him... when he had woken up in an episode, screaming and crying like some little child. All of his team-- the people he was supposed to lead-- were standing around his bed and staring at him as he fell apart. Sam had had tears in his eyes, Natasha had looked so pale, Tony had been so withdrawn. Clint and Bruce both looked as if they knew they were intruding, but they were still there. Like he was some sort of circus freak show, or a horrible tragedy you couldn't look away from. None of them could look away. Like the Hindenburg, exploding into a fireball under its own vastness. 

 

And now, with his perfect, superhuman memory, he would never be able to forget those looks. He could never look them in the eye again. 

 

"Keep breathin', you're doing such a good job, Baby..." 

 

"Don't gotta coddle me, Barnes..." he heard himself say, but it didn't feel like it was really him saying it. His voice was rough and weak and far away. 

 

Bucky made a breathless noise that could have been exasperation or a chuckle. Steve was still hearing the humming in the walls too loudly to be sure. 

 

"Nah, but I like to. I love coddlin' you, and lookin' after you, Stevie." It was so genuine and sweet. He sounded just like he always had-- how did he do that? After the train, and the arm, HYDRA, the torture he'd endured. How in the Hell was Bucky able to just be himself for Steve? Just a month or two ago, Bucky didn't speak to the team, except Sam and one or two Russian phrases to Nat. Just six months ago, Buck could go days without uttering a word or even looking at Steve. 

 

As homey and soft as it felt to have his lover so close to him again, he couldn't help but think: How is he not mad? It was all Steve's fault. How did he not blame him for every foul turn of his life in the past seventy fragmented years? His stomach churned and he forced himself to sit up further, away from the soothing metal. 

 

It was quiet for a while-- Steve wasn't sure how long. Bucky radiated warmth and love beside him, ready for him to fall right into his arms and back against the pillows. Steve would love to, really, he would. But his frozen skin was starting to itch and crawl and burn again, and he couldn't do that to Bucky. No more of these attacks, he couldn't do that to him. Bucky had suffered enough-- Steve needed to be alone. 

 

" 'M gonna head out for a run.." 

 

"No, you sure as Hell are not." Bucky's metal hand closed around his wrist as he tried his damnedest to move away and stand up. 

 

To say he didn't know where the anger came from would be a lie (it was always there, just beneath the surface), but it still took Steve by surprise as it swept through his veins like  
ice water, propelling him forward to the edge of the bed despite Bucky's grip. 

 

"I said I'm goin', and I'm goin'--" 

 

"No," Bucky tugged him around to finally face him, kneeling on the bed in front of him "you are not goin' anywhere-- not all alone, and not before sunrise." It was the first time he'd gotten a look at him, and it cooled the bubbling rage in him in an instant. He was left with a cold numbness spreading through him like roots. He was grounded to the spot, staring into Bucky's tired grey eyes and hating himself for what he did to him. What he was still doing. 

 

"I'm no kid, Barnes, I can handle myself--" 

 

"You said you wanted me to take care of you? Here I am, Asshole. Get your ass back in this bed." 

 

Steve huffed out a sigh that even he knew sounded childish, but he tugged fruitlessly at Bucky's grip on his wrist again. "It's just a jog, Buck, I'll be okay! Just gotta clear my head--maybe you do too, or you wouldn't be saying shit like this--" 

 

"It's not even 6 o clock in the morning, and you just spent two fucking days as a fucking vegetable." Bucky was breathing hard, like he might have some kind of panic attack of his own. Steve could see it, plain as day in his wide eyes. Steve was hurting him again. "Baby, please. Please come here, you can clear your head with me-- don't pull away from me, Steve, please. I need you here." He was begging, actually begging. He had pulled Steve closer at some point that he missed, his flesh hand now cradling his flushed cheek so gently. Like he was precious. All Steve wanted was to fall back into his arms, in the bed where it was warm and too soft but perfect. "You hearin' me, Stevie? I don't need you to be my big protector anymore, I need you to let me in. You said you wanted me to take care of you again? I know you weren't quite yourself when you said it, but you still said it. You need this. An' I need this. I need you to let me do this for you." 

 

He was weak. Physically, mentally-- he was just pathetic. 

 

Steve wasn't sure if he truly sat back down, or if his legs just gave out. Suddenly, he was exhausted, it felt like every single modicum of energy had been used up. Now he was just a shell, even breathing took too much, and he had no choice but to let Bucky pull him back into the cocoon of blankets beside him. He was whispering "thank you, thank you for staying, I love you." and Steve felt like a heel for getting so angry. 

 

"Sorry... I'm sorry, Buck." He said it on a sigh, the words were so slow to form in his mouth. He wondered how many times he'd have to say that before he was worthy of Buck's forgiveness. 

 

"Shh, shh-- it's okay, Stevie. Are you getting tired again?" He asked, but he already knew the answer, and Steve could feel his eyes on him as his own got heavier. He tried to keep them open, fighting his drooping eyelids. 

 

"D'nt wanna.. Buck, d'nt wanna sleep..." he was so tired, but his heart rate had picked up and his skin was getting all tight. The sheets were getting scratchy. He needed to stay awake, he never knew when he'd wake up, he just couldn't sleep anymore. 

 

"If your body wants to sleep, Stevie, you're gonna sleep--" 

 

"You'll be 'ere? Wh'n I geddup?" He was slurring, and if he had the energy he would've been embarrassed. 

 

He didn't hear Bucky's reply before everything went dark, but the arms around him tightened a little more and it calmed Steve's still racing mind as he dropped away from the present. 

 

\----------

 

Sam was coming down later that day. Everything was fluid and warm. He was comfortable and he tried to not think any further past the person in his arms. Bucky didn't know how much time had passed since Steve's earlier attack, but the sun was up. 

 

Steve woke up again much more calmly, just a couple hours before Sam got there. He had left his eyes closed, just breathed and snuggled in closer to Bucky's chest. He slid his hands along his metal arm and took a long moment to just lay there and be warm and half asleep. Bucky's chest ached and he grinned when Steve finally opened his eyes and looked up at him. He loved him. He loved him so much it hurt, and he could almost trick himself into thinking it was some type of a normal day. The physical signs of the past day or so were still noticeable. With the serum working slower than usual, his Stevie was left with lips bitten raw and dark circles from his nightmares. There were dark scratches along his arms and neck and chest from his attacks, but there were so damn many of them. It was like with the serum only operating at a basic level, all of his past cuts and scratches were rising to the surface. Somehow though, he looked so lovely. As lovely as he always had. Just the feeling of the big bedroom, all warm and soft and sweet, was almost normal. He was reminded of a far away memory that he couldn't quite place. One that he had missed while recovering his stolen past from HYDRA. 

 

But this had never really happened before. Never. Steve was always lovely, he was fucking beautiful, but that was beside the point. The few times that his Stevie actually slept usually ended in screaming or a scalding hot shower. He hadn't seen him wake up peacefully for years. Maybe before the war, where his memories were still a little fuzzier. 

 

He could definitely get used to this-- this soft, sleepy and ruffled version of his lover that he hadn't seen since before it all fell to shit. He wouldn't stop until this was normal again. Until nightmares and starving and overstimulation were a thing of the past. One day, Steve would be healthy again. One day, they would both be healthy again, and they'd just have to recover together from now on. Bucky could live with that. 

 

He ran his fingers through Steve's hair, and memorized the moment. They didn't say anything until Sam arrived. They did kiss like they needed it to breathe, and held each other tight, and maybe Steve cried a bit, but Bucky didn't mention it. Maybe Bucky cried a bit too. 

 

"Good morning." Sam greeted later, meeting Bucky in the kitchen. 

 

Bucky grunted, not unkindly, but not ready to join the verbal world again. He used to be a real talker, apparently, but after everything that had happened, words exhausted him so quickly. 

 

"How's he doing?" He asked, sitting down at the island as Bucky pushed a mug of coffee into his hand. 

 

He shrugged "He was okay earlier. Had a nightmare or something at some point in the night and tried to leave to go for a run. As if everything's fuckin' normal, or something." He sighed, gulping his coffee. He was still tired somehow. "But it worked out okay, and we both got a some more shut eye. He's been fine since, mostly. A little weepy, a little pissed off." He cleared his throat "Definitely embarrassed. He will not be happy to see you." 

 

Sam nodded in understanding "That's.. yeah, that's all we can expect, really. Where is he?" 

 

"Takin' a leak. I'm making breakfast, you want some?" 

 

"It's 1 o clock." He raised a brow, but Bucky just grunted again, biting the inside of his cheek against the sudden wave of anxiety that clamped down around his chest. 

 

1 o clock? He hid his surprise pretty well, he thought. After nearly seven decades as a spy, he sure would hope so. 

 

"Breakfast food is the best food. And then Stevie's got options-- won't feel pressured into eating a whole sandwich or something. That'll just freak him out, ya know?" 

 

He hadn't thought it could be any later than ten o clock. Since he had arrived at the Tower-- since he started coming back to himself under the care of Sam, Steve, and Bruce-- Bucky had kept meticulous track of the time. It was his routine. His routine was a part of his Systems, he needed them to keep himself balanced. There was a vice grip tightening around his ribcage, and his breaths were harder to come by-- everything was off. He was learning to get more lax in his self imposed rules, but this... this was just too much. He had to get a hold of himself-- Steve needed care, Bucky couldn't go reverting to the Soldier by dinner time. The world spun for a second, all disoriented, and then Steve came back in. Suddenly he didn't give a shit what time it was. He was anxious for a whole other reason, but at least he managed a deep breath. Steve would always be fresh air to him. 

 

"Heya Stevie-- we've got a guest." His insides tied themselves into knots as Steve stalled in the doorway, looking completely thrown by Sam's presence. He refocused as quick as ever, though, doing his best to pretend none of the past few days had happened. 

 

"Mornin' Sammie." He said, and Bucky never said that his best was convincing. Steve was not convincing. 

 

"How're you feeling, Man?" 

 

Steve just shrugged, turning his back on the both of them to get his own cup of coffee. "I'm alright. How're you?" 

 

Sam caught on, of course. Steve couldn't hide the circles still under his eyes, and the raw look of his bitten lips, and the slight hunch in his shoulders that usually only Bucky seemed to be able to see. Most people thought his posture was military perfection like the rest of him, but Bucky remembered when Steve's spine was curved all funny and his posture was different. He still overcompensated with a teeny hunch in his right shoulder. It was in his walk, too. But nobody saw those little things, you couldn't without knowing him as the skinny little twerp Bucky knew. Sam saw something though, even if he didn't know what he was looking at, and Bucky felt a little of the worry crushing his chest lift off. They had Sam on their side. Maybe that could be enough. It would have to be. 

 

"I've been better." 

 

Steve didn't respond to him. Instead he sipped his coffee and didn't look either of them in the eye as food was all set out. There was tension building up in the silence, and Bucky knew it wasn't just his paranoia creating the anxiety. 

 

All the bacon and eggs were gone, and Bucky made a note to run to the store later (on second thought, he'd just order it. He hated the store, it was impossible to track the exits, and it was too likely that someone would recognize him.). He made oatmeal from scratch, though, toasted up the last of the bread, and cut up some fruit. There weren't a ton of groceries around, to be honest, and a pang of guilt struck Bucky deep in his gut. Steve had eaten nothing in more than a week. 

 

"We've missed you, Man. You gave us quite the scare..." 

 

Bucky watched the emotions flicker across Steve's face as he contemplated whether or not to even reply. 

 

"'M sorry, Sam. It wasn't fair to you guys, I should've handled it." Heat bloomed up in Bucky's chest, then, and it had become hard for him to label how he was feeling, but this was anger. It was like a wave crashing into him. Handled it? 

 

"Handled it? Steve, I-" Sam's eyes were wide but he trailed off with a sigh, scratching something off for a later time. "It's okay, just... I know you don't love the idea of cognitive therapy sessions, but--" 

 

Steve was already shaking his head no, and Bucky felt the last of the hope he had for the day dissipate. No matter how much he appeared to change, he was still Steve Rogers for better or worse: stubborn, pissed off, and desperate to prove himself. 

"C'mon, please-- it doesn't have to be me. We can go down to the VA and I can introduce you to some people."

"I'm not crackin' up, Sam, I'll be fine, I was just overtired and--" 

 

"Overtired?" Bucky heard himself cut in, pissed as Hell and unable to shut up about it anymore. The image of how he'd looked on that bed yesterday choked up his throat for a moment "When I walked into that room, Steve, you were as gone as I was when I first came here! You didn't even know who I was at first--" 

 

"It was a bad dream, we all have them, it's no big deal--"

 

"No big deal?!?--"

 

"Guys!" Sam cut them both off, glaring fiercely at each other. "Okay. Steve, what happened over the past few days was a very big deal. Not normal, especially for someone with your enhancements." Then he looked at him, and Bucky felt like his Mam was staring him down with those disapproving eyes "Barnes, you could be a bit more tactful. C'mon, Man, be gentle." 

 

Maybe he'd spoken too soon about Sam knowing his Stevie so damn well-- anyone that really knew Steve knew that he didn't respond too well to gentleness. When he's still sleepy and sweet in the morning? Yeah, maybe. Definitely while getting talked off the ledge of one of his fits, or huddled on the floor of the shower. But, while in these pig-headed moods where everything is a slight? Nope. No. 

 

"I'm not an invalid, Sam." 

 

"I never said you were." 

 

"Don't need to." Steve's jaw was clenched, his words were clipped. He still wasn't looking at them, staring down into his coffee cup. 

 

"Goddamnit, Steve, you said you wanted help!" Bucky said, knowing he was being cruel, but the oatmeal was getting cold and there was a wet heat burning his eyes. "If everything's just as fine as you say, then eat something." 

 

It got Steve's attention. There was terror in his eyes-- not anxiety, not pain, nothing but absolute panic. Bucky shook away the feeling that he was just hurting Steve all over again, like on that fucking hellicarrier. He wasn't. Steve was hurting himself. Steve said he wanted help, and now he wasn't letting anybody in. Again. 

 

"Buck, I--" then there was the betrayal, and god, Bucky was the lowest dirt, he was. He ached for his Stevie "I'm just not hungry, it's been a long couple days." 

 

Then there was silence where Bucky could only hear the pounding of his heart in his ears. Steve's jaw was clenched, and he scowled down at his hands twisted on the island countertop. 

 

"Steve, please--"

 

"No--" he jumped to his feet, about to continue, until his face suddenly drained of its color and he wobbled. He slapped his hand down onto the counter top to save his slipping coordination, and Bucky was by his side so fast that he barely recognized that he'd moved. His stomach flipped. "L-lemme go, 'M okay..." he pushed feebly at Bucky where he was gripping his waist, and Sam while he stood close on his other side. Bucky wasn't sure he could let go if he tried, so he shook his head. 

 

"Get Bruce." He mouthed at Sam, trying not to freak Steve out any more than he was. "Can you walk, Stevie? Come sit with me on the sofa..." 

 

"'Course I can walk. Quit treatin' me like a kid--" he took four steps before his legs gave out, and Bucky wasted no time in scooping him up and carrying him to the living area. He ignored the muttered protests and wriggling, setting him down and steeling himself for that withering glare Steve had. But it never came. 

 

Steve looked pale and slack on the sofa, completely still. Everything in Bucky seemed to freeze, and his breath caught on a ragged noise as he pressed his fingers into his neck for a pulse. Steve looked dead. Well and truly, and Bucky was so lost at the thought that he trembled down to his bones. His whole body, he just couldn't contain it. 

 

His heartbeat was there. He didn't have the presence of mind to think anything else, because at least it was there. Stupid, stubborn bastard. 

 

"He went down again?" Bruce was on the other side of Steve, trying to shoo away Bucky's fingers at his neck. He growled in lieu of replying. Like Hell he was moving from that spot. 

 

He had never liked Banner. It was a "doctor thing", as Sam called it. He had a reaction to all that clinical shit that he just couldn't help. He wished that he could like Bruce, and maybe one day he would, but he could be a real dick sometimes. 

 

"Barnes." 

 

"Yeah. He-he made it to the sofa and then he was out..." he shouldn't have pushed him so hard. He didn't know what he was doing. He was trying to care for his Stevie like he had taken care of Bucky since he'd come home, but the situation was too different, their minds were too different. Or, maybe they were even too similar. His bones felt hollow, he felt useless, staring at Steve's pale face. He'd been doing so good that morning, and Bucky had still failed him. 

 

"It was just like last time, he must've overworked himself again." Sam said. He sounded so far away. Bucky just stared, entranced as Steve's chest rose and fell steadily. 

 

"I thought the IV drip would help him stabilize the serum, but he's burning through it too fast. He's not getting enough actual calories, it's going right through him." 

 

He took his vitals and a vial of blood. Bucky could barely keep from growling again as the Doc poked and prodded at him while he wasn't even awake to consent. 

 

"There's more of the fluid down in the lab-- we'll have to have him hooked up at least once a day. Probably twice if he's not eating a single time throughout." Bruce was saying, and Bucky barely kept from scoffing. 

 

"He's not gonna go for that." His voice was a croak. 

 

"He has no other choice." He shrugged and Bucky wanted to punch him in his stupid face. 

 

Steve ended up back in bed, hooked back up to that nasty old IV bag, slowly regaining color in his cheeks. He'd be so embarrassed when he woke up. Again. 

 

He slept for hours. He didn't stir a single time while Bruce did his thing, or after Sam left, or when Bucky slid into bed beside him and rested his ear over his heart. He wasn't sure what he would say to him when he woke up-- according to Banner, he'd be waking up sooner than last time-- but he knew he couldn't stay silent. 

 

\----------

 

They let them go for a little while. Sam and Bruce were the only ones to venture down to Steve and Bucky's floor for the first few days after Steve woke up. Clint felt guilty. Bruce acted like he felt guilty, but the undercurrent of anger in him left them all more on edge than usual. Tony almost seemed to be grieving. Natasha wasn't sure why she was putting it off so much. Obviously, she felt responsible too, but she had never been one to leave something like this without facing it. She supposed she just knew that there was nothing to say. 

 

"I'm sorry" was definitely not something Steve would want to hear. "How are you feeling?" would immediately put him on the defensive, according to Sam. If she knew Steve (and honestly she was wondering about that considerably more over the 5 days since the "Incident") then everything put him on the defensive. Part of her-- a tiny, panicked little part-- was terrified that the next time she saw her friend, she'd just burst into tears. Which would be a decidedly out of character thing to do, but since everything happened, she hadn't really been feeling like herself. 

 

Clint had been remarkably patient, and didn't comment on it once, until just that morning. On the fifth day. She'd been sitting at their kitchen island with a cup of coffee going cold in her hands. 

 

"Tasha?" He'd said to get her attention, standing on the other side of the counter across from her. He smiled as he signed "Want me to heat that up for you?" 

 

They didn't talk much when it was just the two of them. They signed mostly everything, enjoying the peace and quiet, and Clint loved not needing to put his aids in. 

 

She shook her head. "No thanks." She signed back. "I've just been thinking a lot." 

 

"Penny for your thoughts?" He replied. She loved that expression in sign. Maybe she just loved watching Clint sign, period-- his hands were so strong and beautiful. 

 

"It's nothing." She gestured stiltedly "I don't want to talk about it." 

 

She didn't want to talk about how it felt to know that she hadn't been trusted by her best friend when he'd been hurting. Or how she could see his disturbed and unfinished sketches in her mind's eye whenever she laid down to sleep. Or the look James had had on his face when he first saw Steve writhing and bloodied on their bed. He'd known more than them, but still-- the shock and horror and.... her heart ached. She felt so empty. 

 

Natasha looked down into her lukewarm coffee. It was dark, just sweet enough, just how she liked it. It was a waste of perfectly good coffee. Instead of enlisting Clint to make good on his offer, she pushed her chair back and went to the microwave herself. 

 

They stood side by side in silence as her coffee heated and he drained his fourth cup. It wasn't until the timer went off and her mug was back in her hands that she figured out what to say (sign). 

 

"If there was ever something wrong, or you were unhappy, or feeling..." her fingers fumbled around the gestures, trying to pick her words without looking like an idiot "Please never hide from me. I guess that's what I'm saying." She spoke, then. She'd need to hear it out loud, to know he wouldn't wither away and break down like Steve. "No matter what, please let me in." It was embarrassing when her voice cracked on the last word, even just with him. Clint, who knew her like nobody else on this whole planet. Not even Fury, not even Coulson. Not even Sam or Steve. 

 

When she finally looked up at him, he was smiling softly at her, holding out a hand with the pinky out. She couldn't resist the breathless laugh that bubbled up her tight throat, linking her little finger around his. His gaze was serious, though, as she met his eyes. 

 

"Tasha, you'll never be in the dark with me. Pinky promise." 

 

She wanted to say "I love you" but what came out was "Still? The pinky thing? Really?" 

 

"Can't break a pinky promise, that shit's binding." He managed to get another laugh out of her, but the room was oppressively quiet when it faded. "I'm gonna visit Steve and Bucky today. Maybe after lunch? You coming with?" 

 

Her chest ached again, a twisting feeling just below her heart. She nodded despite it, taking a sip of her now-hot coffee. 

 

Sitting at the table on the communal floor for lunch, everyone picked at their food in silence. Natasha didn't even pretend to eat, her soup rapidly cooling in front of her just like that morning's coffee. She was beginning to sense a theme to her day, and forced herself to chew and swallow a bite of the crusty bread that Bruce had made. It was definitely actually delicious, but it still just tasted like cotton in her mouth. She ate another bite, soaking it in the broth to make it easier. 

 

It was the first she'd eaten all day, and she felt hollow and light headed. Not even a full day with a fast, but perfectly human metabolism, and she was already feeling the effects of an empty stomach. How long had Steve gone-- like, what was his record? How did he do this and still stand upright, let alone go about his day without any indication of something being wrong? Even while running, like, 40 miles a day? Why did he torture himself like this? How did she not notice for so goddamn long? 

 

The bread sat in her stomach like a rock, but the soup was good. Fortifying and hot, but light. Nothing too complex, perfect for the late autumn weather. 

 

"Tasha and I are going down to see Steve today-- think we could get him to eat some of this? If we brought some?" Clint broke the silence, addressing Bruce (or Sam, whoever answered first), but everyone dropped their spoons to look over at them. Like they'd just declared an impossible mission plan. Stark gave out some noise that might have been a laugh, but sounded more strangled than that (he looked awful, like he did after days of working in the lab with no notion of date or time. Natasha couldn't wait for Pepper to get home from her conferences in Melbourne). She withered him with a dark glare. 

 

"You're going down? To see-- I don't know if you want to do that. He's... he's unpredictable." Bruce stammered. 

 

"I think it could help!"Sam piped up from where he'd been staring into his murky broth like a crystal ball, hope in his eyes that made Natasha feel warm "Seeing people that aren't explicitly there to monitor his health might help him open up." 

 

Bruce pursed his lips, about to retort--

 

"We'll bring a thermos down with us, then." She cut in, pointedly not looking at the doctor in favor of nodding to her friend across the table. Sam looked so tired. They were all exhausted, of course, but Sam actually looked as deflated as they all felt. Steve would be drowning in guilt if he could truly see Sam and what he was doing to him. "Thanks Sam." 

 

He grinned at her, and her gut twisted. The idea of going down to visit their friend was written in stone now, no backing out. She couldn't let that smile down, he was counting on her to help. Steve needed help, but Sam did too. He just cared enough about himself to seek it out. 

 

The elevator was slower than it had ever been, she thought, gripping Clint's hand in one of hers with a thermos in the other. 

 

The apartment looked somehow different than she remembered-- more cluttered, maybe? There were a few sketchbooks piled on the coffee table and the kitchen counter. Some plates and bowls scraped clean of food were sitting in the sink. Maybe that meant Steve was feeling better? But what about James? Everybody knew about the Systems, and how James had a nearly obsessive need to follow them for cleaning and organizing. Their apartment was usually spotless. 

 

"Bucky?" Clint called out "Steve? It's Clint and Tasha." 

 

There was a long moment of quiet before Barnes came around the corner, his mouth set it a firm line, circles under his eyes. He managed a weary smile at them, and Natasha recognized the door he had come out of as the studio where she had poured over Steve's thousands of sketches and paintings. She felt a little nauseous.

 

"Hey guys. Sorry 'bout the mess..." he grinned wryly before turning back into the room "Stevie, get out here." 

 

She wasn't sure what she was expecting, but Steve didn't look more than ten pounds lighter than his usual self, hardly emaciated except for his little waist, which looked even more pinched in under the thick sweater he wore. He was white as a sheet, except for his raw lips and fading scratches on his neck and the part of his forearms that she could see where he'd rolled up his sleeves. All things considered, Steve looked remarkably normal. A lot like James-- tired and grim, but he didn't smile at them like James did. He caught sight of them and nearly completely hid himself behind James, as much as he could while not looking like a five year old hiding behind his mom. She wanted to say that she couldn't believe he was actually still embarrassed, but this was Steve, of course he was still embarrassed. But, it still hurt so fucking bad. It was worse than him pulling away from her that horrible night (barely a week ago, but it felt like years) as if she was going to hurt him. Steve didn't want to see anybody, he didn't want to see her. She felt like a monster again, and it sucked. 

 

Pushing everything down, she forced herself to speak "Hey Steve-- we brought some soup from lunch. You don't have to eat it or anything right now. But we wanted to say hi." 

 

"We miss you." Clint chimed in, and he was damn right, they did. 

 

"We miss you guys, too." Bucky replied when Steve didn't. "Want to help us out? We're doing some reorganizing." 

 

She didn't, honestly. She wanted to go down to the gym and spar until her legs felt like jello and she could pretend to forget all about the panicked look that flashed across Steve's face right then. 

 

"Sure." 

 

It started out slow. They were acutely aware that they were trespassing, even though they'd been in this room plenty of times before, Natasha especially. Steve sat rigidly beside Bucky, flipping through a sketchbook from early 2013-- one that had some of the most "self portraits" in it, if she remembered correctly from her long hours in here while Steve had slept. 

 

But then they started working. James gently pried the book from Steve's hands and told them all where things were going. They started chatting about meaningless things, and then at one magical point, Steve joined in. He grinned, even chuckled a little, at one or two of Clint's stupid jokes, and Natasha's rib cage swelled with a big feeling that felt mysteriously like hope. James looked less tired when they were finished, just lying around in the waning November sun in the big, bright room. Natasha was pressed into Clint's side, listening to him tell some story about a totally fucked mission in Tbilisi, and took in the smiles on the faces in front of her. Steve was curled against James' chest, sitting between his legs. 

 

Having known Steve before Barnes's return and after, the change in him was like night and day. For all his issues, Steve had come into himself within days of James being back in the Tower. It was why they had stopped worrying about him in the first place. But even before, hunting him down with everything he had, Steve had been more alive than Natasha had ever seen him. 

 

Steve before James was reserved to a fault. He was distant, business-like, awkward. After he and Tasha became friends at SHEILD, he loosened up but there was still something closely guarded for him. Steve held everyone at arms length, and it could be miconstrued as aloofness and superiority. People felt the same way about her. He hated personal conversations, crowds and parties were possibly the fastest way to make him panic, he hated physical contact (after the past few days of realizations, though, she knew that there was more than one reason for that). 

 

When James first came to the Tower, there was a full month long block where they didn't leave their floor. If you wanted to see Steve or Bucky you went to them, and even then it depended on how Bucky was feeling. After that, though, (an originally silent and skittish) Bucky started accompanying Steve to the gym, and up for movie nights. The further into recovery he got, the more they seemed to come back to life-- not just Barnes, Steve too. With Bucky, Steve wanted to be touched, maybe even craved it after so long denying himself. Now, he and James were attached at the hip. And mouth. And most other places. Natasha had thought that they'd be more like her and Clint, not liking too much physicality, especially with the team around. It wasn't, though. Without the fear of being queer in a time of back alley murders and blue card discharges, the two of them had rekindled their relationship as a sort of testament to making up for lost time. Natasha wouldn't be surprised if they started yelling from the rooftop about how in love they were. James kissed Steve, no matter where they were, like he was reclaiming more of himself from HYDRA every time he did it. Steve curled up against him at any opportunity, forgetting his self imposed role of the fearless Captain, petting his long hair on movie nights, letting himself be vulnerable just that little bit more. With Bucky in the Tower, Natasha finally felt like she was really meeting Steve. Not Captain America. 

 

It had been nearly three hours before Clint and Natasha both got the text from Bruce to assemble for "Family Dinner", as Tony called it. Bucky and Steve both got messages to their phones too, but they didn't even bother to open them. 

 

A sullen quiet dulled the room as they all seemed to remember at once that they weren't just hanging out. Everything that had happened had still happened. Part of her wanted to personally ask them "Hey, wanna come up for dinner? Bruce cooked a whole chicken." But, they'd made progress today. At least, she hoped so. They shouldn't push it. 

 

"Well, we should head upstairs..." she mustered up her strength and broke the silence. Clint's joints cracked and popped as they stood. Whether it was from how long they sat, or because he was an old man, she couldn't be sure. But she was sure she'd make fun of him for it later. 

 

"Yeah, I.... thanks for stopping by, guys." Steve smiled, but he wasn't making eye contact anymore, and her chest clenched. She wanted to cup his face and make him look at her. He was so obtuse she could scream. 

 

"This was nice." James chimed in as they walked them to the elevator. Steve was looking more pale again-- was this considered exertion? Walking across his apartment? He was trying to hide heaving breaths as they reached their destination. 

 

"Yeah, we all miss you..." Clint replied. 

 

She wasn't sure what made her do it, why all of her years of training to eradicate emotional response suddenly abandoned her, but she stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Steve's shoulders and hugged him tight. Nothing was said, but it didn't have to be. That was a great thing about their friendship. After a moment of catching up to her, Steve's big arms were wound around her, too, and she never wanted to step away. 

 

But she did. Eventually. Things still weren't okay, but it was enough to have tried to make them better for just those few hours on the floor of the studio. 

 

"Don't forget about that soup, mal'chik. It's good." She reassured them both, but she was really just talking to Steve. James still smiled at her. 

 

The elevator closed behind them, and she'd be lying if she said she didn't tear up a little when it was all over. 

 

\----------- 

 

Bucky had never slept well by himself. Especially now, with his memories restored, it seemed like there was always someone in bed beside him. First, it was Becca and Nellie and Alice all piled into their tiny room in Indiana, then Brooklyn. Then there was Stevie, as they grew to do more than just have sleepovers and took up living together after Miss Sarah passed. Then there was the war-- he hadn't gotten a single good night of sleep till Steve was back at his side every night. Even then, neither of them were sleeping much, wracked by nightmares and grappling with the idea that they might be losing their minds in the violence. 

 

The particulars of his decades in HYDRA were still fuzzy to him. He didn't remember ever really sleeping there. He rested on missions, sure. But he was mostly dozing or frozen. He was missing something too important to sleep without. Even though he had had no real memory of Steve pressed up close to him, his body still remembered. His warmth was too deeply ingrained in Bucky's psyche to truly sleep without it. 

 

So, when he woke up alone with Steve's side of the bed empty that night, he wasn't surprised that he'd woken. In fact, a peculiar sense of gratitude to his sleeping habits stirred in his chest. Who knows where Steve had gotten to? 

 

He was up and out of bed in one smooth motion, about to launch a full reconnaissance mission through the whole damn tower, but stopped when he saw the bathroom light on. The crack of the door was overflowing with steam, and Bucky felt cold with dread. 

 

"Steve! Stevie--" what he found when he opened the door was not what he was expecting. 

 

Steve wasn't under the spray of the running shower. He stood naked and stock still, clothes torn away and in a heap on the floor as if he had been about to get in, but instead he stared blankly at the foggy mirror. Bucky had had catatonic episodes back when he'd first come home to Steve. He couldn't remember what Steve had done for him, though. He didn't even know if this was one. At a loss, Bucky reached out his metal hand to gently slide the fingers up his Stevie's spine. 

 

"Steve?"

 

At the first touch of his hand to his back, it was like a switch was flipped. Steve didn't jump, or get visibly startled, or even look surprised. He just met Bucky's gaze in the mirror's reflection and started to cry. 

 

"Buck, I...." his voice was raw and thick, and Bucky could barely hear him over the shower spray against the bathroom tile "I-I c-can't--" he dissolved into incoherent sobs, unable to look at Bucky or himself in the bathroom mirror anymore. 

 

There was nothing to do but hold him, really. If there was something better for him, Bucky didn't know what it was. 

 

They stayed like that for a long time before Bucky started them moving back to the bedroom, getting a pair of sweats on Steve before joining him back on the mattress. He'd cried himself out to the point where he was doing nothing more than sniffling and whimpering, and Bucky scooped him up and sat them both against the headboard. How many times had they been in the opposite position? With Bucky whimpering into Steve's chest after a flashback or nightmare? Bucky thought about it briefly, and held Steve tighter. 

 

"How're you feeling?" He asked after a long moment where Steve seemed to calm down. 

 

It didn't look like he was going to get any reply-- Steve twisted his fingers into Bucky's shirt and heaved a long sigh, but made no move to speak for a long moment. He burrowed into the crook of Bucky's neck and shoulder and took a long, deep breath. 

 

"... I can't do this anymore.." he finally rasped "Buck, I-I'm broken, I'm crackin' up, I really am, I'm drownin' all the damn time, I--!" 

 

He was getting more and more panicked by the time he cut himself off, and Bucky was shushing him gently, trying not to let his own anxiety show. 

 

"Whoa, whoa-- you're not crazy, Pal, you're not. I promise, Steve.. you've gotta calm down, Babydoll--"

Steve sat up then, and just looked into Bucky's face like a wild man. He scanned him up and down, eyes brimming, but he refused to let the tears fall. 

"I need Sam." He stared Bucky down with a feverish gleam in his big blue eyes. Desperate. It took him a second to even register what Steve had said (what they had been trying to get him to do since long before this ordeal began a week ago). 

 

"You need-- okay. Okay, yeah." He sputtered "JARVIS? Get Wilson down here please." 

 

"Yes Sergeant Barnes." The AI replied, but Bucky hardly heard it. His heart was pounding, his blood was racing in his veins-- they were finally making headway. 

 

"I'm so proud of you, Steve." He couldn't help but say. 

 

"I-I can't do this alone anymore, I c-can't." His gaze changed, like the admission had sapped his energy. He slumped back into Bucky's side and tucked himself under his chin, breaking into fresh sobs, but it was alright. Everything would be okay. He really wanted help this time, they were gonna be alright. His soft blonde hair tickled Bucky's nose, and wasn't that just one of the greatest things? He kissed lightly at every part of him that he could reach without jostling him too much, and tried to control his own feelings that were rising in his chest. There was the fear of what he had seen and heard, but the sheer possibility of moving on. Of getting help. He didn't even know quite what he was feeling, but it made him want to hold Stevie tighter and never let go. 

 

"You're never alone, Stevie." He whispered, squeezing him gently. They waited for Sam with nothing but Steve's whimpers and gasps and Bucky's gentle murmuring to break the silence, but it didn't take him long. 

 

"Hey, JARVIS gave me quite the wake up call." He didn't even yawn. Sam looked completely awake and alert as he rounded the bed. As if he'd been prepared for this. "What's happenin', Steve?" 

 

Steve wasn't crying anymore, just focusing on taking deep breaths, his cheek pressed into Bucky's collarbone. Bucky stroked his back, counting each vertebra in his head as he went up and down his spine, keeping both of them calm. 

 

"Sam." He sighed out his name like he was too relieved to feel anything else, and sat up just a little in Bucky's embrace. "Can't do it anymore... I-I need help.." then the shame crept into his tone, his body language. He slouched over, looking down at his hands, blushing a shade of pink that Bucky usually thought was endearing and beautiful and sexy. He'd give anything for it to go away now. 

 

Sam just nodded, not even looking like he'd been summoned at ass o clock in the morning for this. Bucky would never say it out loud, but he sure as Hell admired Sam Wilson. "Alright-- good job, Man. I'm proud of you, it takes a lot to say that out loud. I'll put on a pot of coffee, and we'll talk, okay?" 

 

He didn't budge until he got a nod from the both of them, and once he'd left, Bucky leaned down and pressed a kiss to Steve's temple. It was right there, why not? A big warmth had flooded his chest-- love, pride, the lifting of a massive weight off his shoulders. Steve was getting help. He didn't even know what time it was, but the sun was just starting to peek out and Bucky was over the moon. 

 

"Let's go to the sofa?" He phrased it as a question, and Steve nodded. 

 

They were gonna be okay. Everything was gonna be okay. 

 

\-----------

 

"I don't really know what to say." He was mumbling, but it seemed to take all he had just to get it said at all. 

 

Sam shrugged with carefully pretended nonchalance that he thought Steve couldn't see through, and sipped his coffee. He had a notepad on his lap. Should he lie back on the sofa to fulfill the stereotype of talk therapy? Was this what talk therapy was? 

 

"How about we start with why I'm here right now." He prompted, and guilt crashed over Steve like a wave. It was barely dawn and Sam was downstairs putting up with his bullshit when he could be sleeping. 

 

"Don't you do that, Stevie." Buck said from close beside him "I know what you're doing." 

 

He was beginning to regret asking Bucky to stay with him. 

 

"What am I doing, then?" Part of him was glad that he didn't have the energy to be properly angry. Bucky didn't deserve that. 

 

"Blaming yourself." He replied, and the other part of Steve wanted to clock him one. He settled for a solid punch in the arm and Bucky made a soft "oof". Steve slouched back into him, though, too tired to continue being angry all of a sudden. 

 

"I want to be here, Steve. No matter what time, no matter where." Sam was making that tender and compassionate face, and it was so genuine that Steve could cry. Again. Because he hadn't been doing enough of that. "I'm your friend and I'm here to help." 

 

Steve had said he wanted help. He had done this to himself. 

 

"I woke up in the middle of the night. I used to not sleep at all, now I can't fucking stop... I got no energy, like before..." All that he'd been doing had finally slowed down the serum. That's what Bruce said. "I hate sleeping..." 

 

"Why?" 

 

"B'cause I don't know where I am when I wake up..." or when he was. Or even really who he was, when it got down to it. Whether he was small or big. Asthma attacks and panic attacks felt so similar. 

 

"Okay." Sam paused and looked down at his notepad, but didn't write anything. Then, he put it away before continuing, and Steve felt something loosen in his chest. "How about when you woke up just now, what did you do?" 

 

It was such a basic question, that Steve felt stupid. Stupid, because Steve didn't want to answer it. He didn't have the energy to do this anymore, he had to go back to sleep-- or maybe he was just embarrassed. He rested his head on Buck's shoulder and considered trying to finesse his answer in a way that would make it sound better, but what was the point in that? What was the point of all this bullshit if he didn't tell the truth? 

 

"I got up an' went to the shower, but it wouldn't go hot enough. JARVIS said I didn't have the proper codes to go any higher." Steve snarled. Tony. It had to be fucking Stark, and Steve wanted to say that he had no right, but it was his Tower. He'd have to shower on the gym floor now. "I mighta... maybe I overreacted." It was a blur. He had been tearing at his clothes, tearing at his skin, he remembered that. He couldn't breathe, he remembered that. He could hear his blood pounding and the walls humming and-- "I was havin' one of my fits-- with the noises an' the burning an' s-stuff.. then I heard Buck, sleepin' in the next room. And then, I heard him wake up." He took a measured sip of coffee, still savoring the burn, even though he knew he shouldn't. 

 

"What happened then, Steve?" 

 

All eyes were on him. Sam was looking at him with unwavering acceptance and nothing more. He wasn't quite sure what expression he'd expected from a therapist, but it would have been more simpering and pitying. The kind of look nurses used to give him when he was a kid and they couldn't just tell him that he was gonna die before he was ten. Sam was different. Sam was good. Well, Steve knew that, but from sitting in on Bucky's first sessions... they had been different. Less like a conversation and more of a "session". The Winter Soldier had needed that structure. 

 

Bucky was stroking the hair at the nape of his neck, and Steve wanted to disappear right into him, he felt so good. He sighed and snuggled closer against him, trying not to think about the horrible wave of feelings from over the last few hours. Buck kissed him on the forehead. 

 

"Stevie, what happened when you heard me wake up?" 

 

"It was... it was like I stepped out of my body. The, um-- when I have a fit, I don't know where I am, I don't know what's going on, everything's all, all blurry." He sighed "Then I heard Buck breathin', and I ended up staring right at myself in the mirror. The focus was so sharp, like a camera." His throat was getting tight again, and his eyes burned with the idea of tears, but he supposed he had nothing left to give, because none came. "I look terrible. It was all foggy, all I could see was my re-reflection... all I could hear was Buck, and my heartbeat-- it was so loud. And I just stopped. Like being f-frozen or, being dead. I felt dead, and all of a sudden I realized that I-I still wanted to be." Then there were the tears. They burned his eyes and blurred his sight, and he couldn't look at anybody if he tried... how could he? 

 

Bucky's hand had stopped moving. It just rested on Steve's neck, warm and heavy. Steve didn't dare look at him. 

 

"Bucky-- Bucky didn' deserve that, he didn't. So, I asked for you, Sammie... I couldn't do that t' you, Buck. I'll never leave you alone, I promise... I just don't trust m'self right now." The tears kept falling, he couldn't see anything, he couldn't breathe and it felt like that time he had pneumonia when he was twelve. The third time he got it, when his lungs were so full of fluid that the doctor told Ma to contact a priest. He was drowning. Had he been drowning all his life? Sometimes it felt like it. 

 

The warm hand on the back of his neck slid down and up along his back at a gentle pace. The rhythm was so calming, and the rush of blood in his ears started to fade. 

 

"Deep breaths, Stevie... deep breaths. I love you... I love you, I love you so much..." The rumble of Bucky's voice came into focus, as did the feeling of Sam rubbing his back. He didn't care that he was being coddled, it all felt so good. Bucky coaxed him into shifting around until he was holding him, cradled between his legs on the sofa. Sam was sitting beside them, his warm hand pressed over Steve's curled up fist and rubbing out the muscles, forcing them to relax. 

 

Maybe he even liked therapy. Maybe. 

 

"Okay, Steve. Here's the game plan:" Maybe not. "you are going to listen to your body. When you gotta sleep, sleep. When you need to eat, eat." Definitely not. His stomach flipped and he suddenly was acutely aware of being empty. He was scraped out like a jack-o-lantern, nothing but a fake smile and missing guts. He hadn't eaten a single scrap of food in two weeks, maybe more. 

 

He asked for help, he said he wanted this. But part of him still needed to see how far he could take it. If the serum starved itself out again, would he wake up another few pounds lighter? What if he could be himself again? All jutting bones and wiry muscle. 5'8". He had been 5'8". 

 

He couldn't eat anything. He couldn't start gaining back weight. Not when he could be so close to making everything right. 

 

"No, Steve, you need to start eating or it'll never get better." Sam said, and Steve belatedly realized he'd been shaking his head. "Breakfast is at 7. We need to get you on a schedule. Who knows? Soon you could start running circles around me again." He tried a smile that was supposed to be reassuring, Steve saw right through it. Being able to work out again was the carrot in front of his nose. Steve felt like he was gonna throw up. 

 

They wanted him to gain weight. Running again was nothing compared to that. He was so empty, emptiness was so simple. Emptiness brought him a step closer to being himself again-- he knew it was ridiculous, but the panic response fluttering in his chest couldn't be helped. He didn't think that he would physically be able to eat if he tried. His mouth just wouldn't open, he was sure of it. 

 

"Hey. Hey pal, look at me." He turned his head and Bucky was right there, close and warm and Steve was hit with such a force of love that it nearly hurt. This was why he asked for help. He was why he asked for help. Buck. "We're gonna take this hour by hour, day by day. I'll be right there with you, okay?" 

 

And somehow, it almost was okay. It was close enough. 

 

\----------

 

Days passed slowly. 

 

Honestly, he didn't really know what day it was until Pepper came home and turned off his music. 

 

"Anyone ever tell you that it's sacrilegious to the Rock gods to turn off AC/DC--?" 

 

"How long have you been down here?" She had her arms all crossed and was still wearing her most business-y pencil skirt from her conference. She must've just gotten back. 

 

"'Honey, I'm home! How are you?' 'I'm just dandy, Pep, how was your big meeting?'" Tony snarked back, evading answering her actual question. He didn't have time for this-- everything was almost ready. 

 

Pep sighed, hands dropping to her sides "No, Tony-- First of all, we've talked about this. It's not healthy for you to hide in the lab every time I go out of town. Second of all, Bruce just tried to catch me up and I am lost. What the Hell's going on with Steve? Have you told Nick yet?" Uh oh, it was the two finger press to the bridge of her nose. She wasn't mad, she was just concerned (well, maybe a little mad), and Tony was playing games. The familiar guilt that had been crushing him since Cap went down was back full force. "Bruce said you've been working for almost five days straight." 

 

"Why'd you ask if you already knew how long I'd been down here?" 

 

"I wanted to see what you'd say." She shrugged. Then, all of a sudden, she was close to him, sitting beside him at his work bench that was scattered with bits and bobs and suit pieces. "So, what has you working so hard?" 

 

He almost didn't want to show her-- he just wanted to get them done and get this the Hell over with-- but, after a moment, he took the tiny piece off the bench and tossed it in the air, catching it before presenting it to her. It was delicate-- pretty beautiful, if he said so himself-- and small, maybe the size of a nickel. 

 

"Steve. It'll help him... with his panic attack stuff. Can you believe he didn't tell anyone?" He wasn't sure which was worse-- the fact that he, Tony Stark, an actual genius struggling with panic attacks and PTSD, knew what to look for and still missed the signs; or that Steve Rogers, actual superhuman and hero to all, was suffering in the first place. The guy couldn't even contract a cold! Tony, for once, wasn't trying to be an asshole, but he found it hard to believe that Dad had missed something so glaring in his wartime notes on "Captain America". 

 

"It reminds me of someone else, actually" he was so lost in thought that he almost forgot Pepper was there, until she took his hand in one of hers, and his new contraption in the other "who was suffering and tried to hide it. Multiple times." 

 

"Okay, that was just rude-- you know better than to point out my shortcomings." He half-joked. But, she was right again. It was rare that she wasn't. 

 

"Come upstairs and eat something." Pepper smiled at him and he was swept up in how much he loved her for a second. She kissed him on the cheek as she stood back up, handing him the piece back. "And take a shower-- God, you reek, Babe." 

 

Once again, she was right. 

 

He spent three more hours in the lab. Pepper came down every hour to try to pry him away from his work, but he was so close! He didn't leave until they were done. So, he could give them to Steve, and maybe one day, look him in the eye again. 

 

It was weird to think of him as "Steve" and not "Cap". He'd spent his whole life resentfully listening to the exploits and adventures of Captain America and his Howling Commandos, then through the miracle of the serum, got to be resentful in person. And, if he was being honest with himself (which was rare), he never really stopped being resentful. Calling him "Cap", thinking of him as that shining beacon of perfection that tore his dad away from him. It provided a buffer zone between his jealousy and Steve's humanity-- the man that was behind that shield (his dad's shield). Tony hadn't just missed the signs, he had dismissed them. He didn't want to see "Steve", he didn't want to see a person. Then, it would only prove that he had been wasting his time, had been being childish. 

 

When Steve had gone down, but especially when he woke up, he had shattered that petty little dream world. And Tony could still hear him-- his friend, despite everything-- screaming and crying, and he had ignored that his suffering was even a possibility. 

 

The two little circular pieces in his hands could only begin to bridge the gap. But it was a start. 

 

It had been two weeks since Steve woke up, and apparently he'd swallowed his mile wide pride and started talking to Wilson. Every day, Sam went down after breakfast with the team-- something Rogers and Barnes hadn't made appearances to since the day Fury fucking showed up and swept Bucky off on that mission that fucked everything up. They had been avoiding pancakes ever since-- and he would "chat" with the two of them. Bruce was in the loop, but he was a tough egg to crack. Tony wanted to go down and present the two of them with his little gift, but he didn't want to interrupt... anything. He didn't want to know what two geriatrics with super enhancements got up to. 

 

"You just don't want to walk in on another one of Steve's episodes." Banner called him out the next time he went down to pester him in the lab. "You would hardly mind just walking in on them fucking-- I know you." 

 

"Et tu Brucie?" He acted hurt "Just give me a solid report: how's Rogers doing right now?" 

 

He scoffed and set down the new nutrient formula he was working on. Bruce just shrugged. "He doesn't take well to being bossed around. Honestly, he's kind of an asshole, but sometimes you catch him off guard and you just see it." 

 

"See what?" 

 

"A moment where he can't hide how much pain he's in. Emotionally, physically-- the guy's a mess. I wish there was another way for me to help besides poking him with IV needles all the time. Calls himself "the pincushion". Sounds like he's just being melodramatic, but Sam thinks it might be something deeper than that." He looked down at the new fluid bag he was getting ready to take up, and Tony's heart sank lower and lower in his chest. But, Bruce wasn't answering the real question here: 

 

"Yeah, but is he bursting into fits a lot? Or is it just a couple of gloomy, bitchy old timers up there?" 

 

"No, he's not going into fits often. Apparently it's only bad when he's been sleeping, or if they get him to eat something. He can get really antsy with the IV, though-- he says he can feel it move in his veins." He cleared his throat "An understandably unsettling experience..." 

 

"Okay-- more information than I wanted or needed, I'll drop my thingie off with him." He turned to leave, but Bruce stopped him. 

 

"Ya know, he's young enough to be my son. Or your son, even. Steve's not an old man, and neither is Barnes." 

 

"Once again-- more information than I wan--" 

 

"No, you're not listening!" And Bruce was getting a little testy now, which meant shut up and agree, so Tony shut his goddamn mouth. "Just, stop making the old man jokes, okay? He'd never say it, but I think it bothers him... you're, ya know, reminding him and reminding him that he doesn't belong here..." 

 

Steve didn't feel like he belonged here? Still, after all this time? At the beginning, when he was first melted out of the ice it was more than understandable, it actually made a lot of sense. But, between leading and living with the team, and Barnes's miraculous return, he had thought.... Well, he guessed that they all had thought everything was fine. Until suddenly it wasn't. 

 

"Wow, Bruce. Working wonders on that guilt. Not piling on of any more of that at all, I'm a new man." He chirped, maybe a little icier than he meant to sound, but he didn't leave the time for Bruce to respond anyway. He turned on his heel and left. 

 

He definitely did not pout. 

 

Finally getting up the nerve to go down to their suite took a lot of psyching himself up, and a stiff drink at ten AM that Pepper could never learn about. 

 

It looked as if nothing had changed-- at least, Tony assumed that everything was usually this spotless, with Barnes living there. Aside from when it was first built, and the incident a few weeks ago, Tony couldn't remember having actually gone down to Steve's suite before. Because he definitely needed to feel more guilty, Jesus Christ. 

 

"Hello?" He called into the living space. 

 

"Tony?" He nearly jumped out of his skin-- Steve was sitting on the floor in the corner. With a view of all exits. His voice was quiet, but he was just across the living space, close enough that Tony had practically been screaming in his face. 

 

"Jesus, Rogers-- wait, where's Barnes?" 

 

"Needed to get out of the suite-- I told him to go spar with Sam." 

 

Tony had a feeling that that was more of a situation of Steve shoving Barnes out of the house to get five fucking minutes to himself. 

 

He nodded. The silence was suffocating, Tony had effectively forgotten everything he was going to say. 

 

"How've you been?" Of course. After all the crazy bullshit he'd been through, Steve was still the one to ask him how he was. He couldn't hold in the scoff.

 

"How am I-- I'm fine, compared to you. You're the one who's been through the wringer--how are you, Steve?" It felt weird, saying his name. It sat funnily in his mouth, and Tony knew this was going to take some getting used to. 

 

Rogers's lips pursed like he'd tasted a lemon "I'm fine. Nothing to worry about..." Tony scoffed again, crossing his arms and lifting an eyebrow at Steve. His eyes flashed and his cheeks flushed, and Tony knew he was being an asshole to the guy now, but he just couldn't stop "I'm getting the help I need, okay?" He snapped. "You think I'm happy about this? Sam has to put up with me and my problems every fucking day, Bruce is treating me like I'm made of glass, and you-- you changed the max temperature for the water on my floor. Natasha tries to act like everything's normal, but she's just so sad. I can see it, I know her. Clint's just trying to look after her, but it's still all my fault. Don't even get me started on Buck, or the f-food, I just..." he finally paused for air, looking down at whatever sketch he'd been working on and his eyes got suspiciously bright. "So, what do you want? You finally found your goddamn flaw! Are you here to gloat, or--?" 

 

"Who do you take me for?" Tony felt sick, he couldn't tell if he was mad because he was hurt or what, but he couldn't let Steve think that "No, I don't think you're happy about this-- none of us are happy about this, Steve. We're fucking grateful that you are finally getting help, trying our best to do what we can or stay out of the way. We feel so fucking guilty that we ignored that a paragon of human perfection can still manage to be so fucked up, and I'm sorry, Steve. I've always considered you a friend and never treated you like one." Steve looked blown away, listening to Tony rant on, but he didn't acknowledge it "I guess you never considered me one-- honestly, that's okay, I deserve it. I just was hoping I could change it." He had to get out of here before Steve could reply, Tony could feel his words losing steam. He took out the two tiny gadgets that he'd spent so long on and slammed them down on the closest end table. "These are for you-- put them in your ears, they filter out white noise, or can let no noise through at all. Maybe they can make your panic attack things a little less intense..." 

 

There was a split second of silence before Steve stood "Tony, I'm sorry, i--" 

 

"It was just a couple hours in the lab, don't worry about it." He turned to leave but then turned back "Oh, and did you mean the shower water you like to boil yourself in? I didn't do a damn thing to your water temperature." 

 

He left without another word, pushing past Barnes and Wilson as they piled off the elevator, but he couldn't stop to chat. He couldn't get out of there fast enough. 

 

\------------

 

"A couple soldiers short this morning?" 

 

Nick Fury was not a man to be trifled with. Clint had known him long enough to know that much. He had even grown to like the guy, most of the time. 

 

Now wasn't one of those times. 

 

This was the last damn time he'd wear his hearing aids to lunch-- the sudden voice nearly sent him jumping into the air, ready to fight. If Nick noticed (and he always did), he didn't say anything. He had another tablet under his arm. 

 

Uh oh. 

 

It wasn't like Fury popped by for social calls-- they all guessed it by the time they recovered from their shock. 

 

"Is Captain Rogers indisposed? We all know it's not like him to take a day off." His face was impassable. He raised his eyebrow and fixed them all with a stare, like he already knew. Like he was testing them. 

 

"He's out for a run." Natasha said, looking stony. 

 

"And Sergeant Barnes?" 

 

"Isn't too fond of groups-- is this actually important, or are you just babysitting?" Tony chirped from over his coffee mug.

 

"I'm not in the habit of wasting time, Stark--" 

 

"Depends on your perspective, I guess." 

 

Nick let out a long sigh, as people usually did when Tony opened his big fat mouth "Where's Rogers?" 

 

There was no response for a beat too long, and Fury narrowed his eye, fully suspicious and maybe even a little concerned. Clint's chest squeezed, anticipation mounting. Honestly, how long a peace did they think they would have? They were protectors of the planet, they were superheroes. Fury was bound to be knocking on their door at some point. They would have had to tell him eventually that one of the best of them was... Clint couldn't even find the words. 

 

"What aren't you saying?" Fury's voice was measured and calm. 

 

"Steve's sick." Pepper was the one that broke-- not surprising. He liked Pepper just fine, she was great. But, not surprising. 

 

"The super soldier has a cold? Miss Potts--" 

 

"I'm treating him. She's right." Bruce interjected, somehow just as calm and practiced. Tony was glaring with a force that made Clint a little nervous that he had finally tried to install those repulsors into his retinas. 

 

"Nick," Tasha said again "he's not fit for the field." Her eyes said a thousand things. Clint had never been close to him like she was. He had always gotten on better with Phil, and Phil loved Nat too, sure. But she and Fury had a deep bond. 

 

His eye went wide, carefully concealing what looked for a second like actual worry "What are the symptoms?" 

 

It was never really a secret, was it? Steve definitely didn't want anybody to know, though. He hadn't even wanted them to know. That just made Clint want to say it more-- Nick should know. What if Steve was sent out into the field? He would never make it, he was so... delicate right now. He had always done everything possible to protect his team. It was just their turn to protect him now. 

 

After weeks of feeling so helpless, they could do something. Whether Steve liked it or not. 

 

So, by some unspoken agreement, they started talking. 

 

\------------

 

Sam loved his career. Really, he did. With every vet he helped, he felt Riley a little closer to him. He liked to think that he would be proud. He would've punched him in the shoulder, said something incredulous and thrilled at the turn his life had taken with the Avengers team, and especially his latest patients. 

 

Steve would've liked Riley. And Bucky. They would've all been friends. God knows, he hadn't been counselor material when Riley knew him-- Sam didn't consider this potential career for longer than a split second, not until his wingman was gone and Sam finally pulled his head out of his ass and went to the VA. He never could have dreamed that it would take him this far, all the way to Sta-Avengers Tower with his own floor, and his own little group of absolutely batshit patients. Like an in-patient superhero VA. It sure was never boring. Even less so when Bucky came along. 

 

When Barnes came home, he was still more Soldier than himself. For a long time, their sessions consisted of just the three of them (Steve sitting on the sofa next to Barnes. He didn't ever say anything, but let Bucky grip onto him at all times) sitting in silence, staring at each other. The Soldier's cold eyes would roam over him, and Sam knew he was cataloging his threat level. Any potential weapons, proximity to Steve, ability to cause harm, etc. It lasted weeks. 

 

When he finally did start speaking, it was clipped. He included nothing more than what he deemed necessary for Sam to know. Steve was his only true reprieve. With Bucky's permission, Steve was the one to tell Sam what was actually going on. Which memories he was trying to place in his timeline that week, how he had been sleeping. 

 

Oh, Steve had added, and Bucky wasn't eating. Sam should've known about Steve's own problems right then-- there wasn't a scrap in their kitchen. Not the fridge, not the cupboards. At that point, Barnes sure as Hell wasn't doing any grocery shopping, so how did Steve not notice his kitchen was bare? But, Sam just didn't think, and that was really beside the point at this juncture. 

 

The point was that as much research as he did, and as much as he knew about food anxiety from dealing with Barnes, and as pure as his intentions with Steve may be, Sam still had no clue what he was doing. 

 

Bucky's issues with eating had been nothing compared to what Steve's were now. He had just forgotten how, like he'd forgotten everything else, and needed to relearn how to schedule time to eat, and eat solid food. Not the weird, intravenous shit HYDRA had been keeping him alive on. It was physical with Barnes, purely physical. His body didn't know how to process solid foods, and his digestive system was learning as he was learning to take care of himself. Steve's disorder was all encompassing, he very nearly had a panic attack just looking at the soup, or smoothie or whatever was put out for him each day. And it just broke Sam's heart. 

 

What if this wasn't even helping? 

 

"We're getting something in him. That's all that matters." Barnes had said on the second day, shaking his head when Sam briefly mentioned it while Steve slept. He had refused and refused to eat anything for lunch that day, and worked himself into such a frenzy that he ran to the bathroom and threw up what little they'd gotten him to eat at breakfast. 

 

Steve's flashbacks to the war, overstimulation from the serum, and body dysmorphia all seemed to play into each other, like some sort of panicky card house. But made of tissue paper. In a wind tunnel. Things had been easier since Tony mysteriously left those ear plugs with them a couple weeks ago. Steve had them in just about all the time, fiddling with the amount of sound through a control panel Stark had had JARVIS program into his phone. 

 

It was great, unless you were trying to get him to listen to you. 

 

Sam couldn't help but think he was massively under qualified for this. He was so fragile. And it was so easy to forget until it was too late, because Steve was so goddamn good at pretending. 

 

That morning, just at the beginning of December, had gone okay. Steve had finally started sessions with him just a couple weeks earlier, but (with the help of some serious coaxing and arm twisting) he was making the little strides they needed to get things going. 

 

Sam had made toast, eggs and coffee-- the eggs were going to be for him and Bucky, he knew, but he always offered some to Steve, which made him go an alarmingly pale shade-- and they'd talked about what foods had been rationed or unavailable in the war times. What was a delicacy in the Depression. Steve contributed like his usual self. He had always been more of an observer, but he'd chuckle, or remind Bucky of the little things. 

 

"What was a delicacy? Everything, to us. A crust of bread and cabbage soup was a delicacy when it was the only thing you ate all day." He'd smirked, sipping his coffee. It wasn't until Sam mentioned that he hadn't touched his toast that he got tense. It wasn't until he caught sight of his own hands like he'd never seen them before that he got quiet. 

 

"What're you thinking about?" 

 

"Nothin'." That was always the immediate response. 

 

"Doesn't look like nothin'." 

 

The periods of silence before Steve answered one of Sam's questions always dragged. He and Bucky sat patiently though, letting him think. That had been hard for Bucky at first, but Barnes was a force now. He'd sit there with Steve for days and just let him think. Just waiting for him to come to his own conclusions, it was amazing. For someone still learning to take care of his damn self, he was one incredible caregiver when it came to others. 

 

Especially someone he was so dedicated to. 

 

"I just... forgot. I forgot that I'd changed." His cheeks blushed and he hid his face in his coffee in his embarrassment. 

 

"You're still the same, Steve. War changes us, some more than others, but you are fundamentally the same person you were before. Serum or no serum." That had become the mantra of Steve's therapy. Well, there were a few of them: "There's no shame in needing help"; "being a superhuman doesn't make you less of a person"; "We're here because we love you and we want to see you be happy"; "It wasn't your fault" came up a lot, too. Only when Bucky stepped out, though-- Steve refused to talk about the train and the hellicarrier and the Winter Soldier when he was around. 

 

Steve hadn't replied. He rarely did when Sam said one of his affirmations. Bucky dropped a kiss to his hair as he passed to get more coffee. 

 

Steve was so comfortable talking about the Depression, and even the more mundane parts of the war, that he periodically forgot that he was in the present, suffering through what the aftershocks of his past had done to his mind. It happened to Bucky, too-- Hell, it even still happened to Sam occasionally. But, pain like that gets further away with time and care. All of the others were further removed from their "tragic backstories" than Steve and Bucky, who had buried their trauma so deep that it exploded, and had spent the better part of a century under the enemy thumb, respectively. 

 

Steve was sketching in the studio while Sam cleaned the kitchen. He turned around to find Barnes standing beside him and nearly swallowed his own tongue trying not to yelp in surprise. 

 

"Jeez, Man-- you're like a damn cat." He hissed, catching his breath. 

 

"Um, sorry." Bucky wasn't aware of his own stealthiness the way toddlers weren't aware of their own strength while handling baby animals "I just... I wanted to ask how you think things are going? What's the game plan?" 

 

His lungs didn't seem to work for a moment trying to come up with an answer that wasn't "I don't know! I'm so out of my depth here!!!". He managed. "I... Things are okay. I wanna discuss his feelings about food directly today in his session.."

 

"I've got an idea." There it was. Bucky had looked like he had something to say from the second Sam came out of the elevator "I've been doin' some research, and I... maybe we should get him cooking? It, it might be dumb, but maybe it'll help 'im get more comfortable around it- ya know, food." He paused, still uncomfortable with talking as much he had been the past couple weeks. Especially sharing an idea. "It, um, might help with the combat fatigue and stuff, too-- since I started knitting, I know that helps me... might be good for him to make somethin'." 

 

Sam's chest felt big and airy all of a sudden, affection for Bucky Barnes sweeping in like it could lift him off the ground. "Yeah, man. We'll try it. Positive associations with food is the first step. You been making sure he feels loved?" 

 

"Who do you think I am, Wilson?" He grinned and disappeared back into the studio. Sam heard him say "What cha workin' on, Sweetheart?" before he tuned back to his kitchen duties. 

 

Every website, all his VA contacts-- everybody. Everybody he asked about how to support a recovering anorexic immediately said "positive reinforcement and support", make them feel beautiful and worthy throughout the whole of their recovery, and no one was better suited to do that for Steve Rogers than Bucky Barnes. Sam could see flashes of what the old Bucky must've been now-- a charming flatterer, a Casanova-- while seeing how he acted with Steve. 

 

He had expected Steve's problems to set back Barnes's own progress, but Sam was surprised and relieved to find that it was actually helping. But, of course it was-- how better could you relearn yourself than by going back to the fundamentals of your past life? Bucky was taking care of Steve again. His accent was stronger, his eyes a little brighter. He thrived while taking care of Steve, and even though he wasn't taking too well to the food and the therapy, Steve seemed to love having Bucky take care of him. Neither of them were happy, but they both were relearning something about themselves that they had lost. 

 

"Stevie?" 

 

"Yeah, Buck?" Sam heard as he approached the open doorway, hoping to broach the idea of going up for "Family Dinner" sometime that week. There was a pause. "What're you staring at?" 

 

"I dunno... you look so pretty this way, Stevie." 

 

"Hmmm." Steve hummed skeptically "What way?" 

 

"Sittin' in the light like that." 

 

"You're bein' too sweet-- did you break something? A lamp, or..." 

 

"Shut up, Punk-- maybe I just love you and like sayin' it. Is that a crime now?" 

 

It was like a scene out of a book. Sam knew he shouldn't be eavesdropping, but he could just picture it: Steve, small and wheezing a little, wearing his suspenders and collared shirt. Bucky unwinding from a day at the docks. The two of them soaked in sunlight, like the studio was, Bucky teasing Steve with cheesy little lines to see him blush and scowl. 

 

He peeked around the door silently, channeling as much of Natasha as possible, and saw them. Steve was still looking frail, but his color was back. Or maybe that was just a blush, since Bucky was pressing his lips to his. 

 

He shouldn't just be chillin' in the doorway, watching his friends mack on each other, but he didn't want to interrupt and-- 

 

His phone buzzed, blowing his cover from the two pairs of super ears. Goddamnit. 

 

"What're you lookin' at, Wilson?" 

 

"Yeah, Sam-- put your eyes back in your head." Steve grinned. 

 

"I just got a text, I didn't wanna interrupt--" his phone buzzed again. "Hold up." 

 

He had two texts from Natasha: "Fury was looking 4 Rogers. We had to tell him somthng." The second one read "Cant hold him off-- brace urselves." 

 

Shit. 

 

They all heard the elevator in the hall, and Sam felt his heart in his throat. 

 

"What's the matter? Sam?" The two men on the bed looked at him quizzically. 

 

"I... Fury's here." 

 

Steve's face went stony and pale, and the remains of Bucky's soft smile turned into a snarl. He opened his mouth to speak, but closed it when he heard a familiar voice from the living area. 

 

"Captain Rogers-- a word, please." 

 

Nobody moved for a long few moments. Steve seemed rooted to where he sat on the bed, his jaw clenched. 

 

"I'll go make 'im leave--" Bucky started to get up, only for Steve to grab him by the wrist. Sam just stood there, just inside the doorway. Fury could probably see him, but he couldn't bring himself to look over and check. 

 

"No. No, I'll do it." Steve looked ashen, but his voice was steady and strong. He was already putting the Captain America mask back in place, preparing to act like nothing was wrong. Sam swallowed around the urge to tell him to let him and Barnes handle it-- for the sake of his tightrope act of recovery. All it would take was the slightest breeze to send him toppling over. 

 

"Captain! Just a conversation. A moment of your time." 

 

The others had told him at least something-- they had to, if SHEILD director Nick fucking Fury was asking a second time instead of just strolling in to the studio and demanding answers. 

 

Steve steeled himself with his best impassive expression before getting to his feet and walking out into the space. 

 

They just looked at each other for a second, and Fury's good eye scanned over Steve's body for injuries. He must've seen the weight loss, the dark circles under his eyes, something, because he pursed his lips and frowned a little. Bucky stood next to Sam like he was barely resisting jumping between the director and him. The air was tense.

 

"Can I get you anything? Coffee, or--" 

 

"How about some answers, Cap? Sit down before you fall down." He gestured to the sofa, and Steve sat silently. They faced each other, like Sam did in their sessions. "I'm waiting." 

 

"I don't know what you want me to say." The tremor in his voice would be undetectable to less practiced ears. 

 

"Yes, you do. How long has this been a problem?" 

 

"Which part?" 

 

That seemed to surprise him-- at least they hadn't told him everything, evidently. 

 

"All of them. List it." 

 

"The over-overstimulation and fits started almost immediately after the serum. The not sleeping... that was when I came out of the ice." He ground out, not looking at any of them, focusing on his hands in his lap. 

 

"And?" 

 

"I don't know when the flashbacks started. Sometime during the war..." 

 

"What about the eating? No use in trying to hide, I know everything." The words were commanding, but his tone sounded almost comforting. 

 

"I..." Steve cleared his throat, and Bucky was rocking back and front on his heels like was going to run to his side "Never eaten much before. I dunno when it became a compulsion, or..." 

 

The silence enveloped them again, Fury nodding slowly. He took a minute to let Steve's words sink in before running a hand down his face and fixing Steve with a steely look. 

 

"When you were defrosted, we provided you with counseling sessions. Did you lie?" 

 

Steve did that thing where he tilted his head to the side a little, kind of shrugging, trying to think of some way to make it sound less bad. 

 

"I might've held a couple things back." 

 

"You've been unfit for the field since day one--" Fury stood, and Steve looked like he wanted to curl in on himself. His shoulders tried to hunch in, but he kept himself ramrod straight. Being strong. "Every time you led your team into battle, you risked the lives of all of them and yourself." He sighed a heavy exhale, huffed through his nose, and Sam braced himself for what was coming "You are on indefinite medical leave from this point forward. Team leadership will go to Stark, and all your missions will go to Barton until you can be relied on to take care of yourself and others--" 

 

"You're firing me." Steve's voice nearly cracked, looking up at Nick, finally. 

 

"No, Captain. I--" 

 

"I can't do anything other than this job, helping people is the only thing I'm good at." 

 

"Yes. Which is why it will be there for you once you've put yourself back together. No more throwing yourself on the grenade, no more actively seeking out opportunities to sacrifice yourself." Steve flinched like he'd been hit, and Bucky was shaking, but Nick didn't stop "You are erratic. I thought it was an asset to have such selflessness, but you've just been unstable all this time." Trying to kill himself. Seeing how far the serum would stretch itself. Steve reacted like every word was a blow. "If you die, you die. But for the sake of others, not as a means of thinly veiled suicide." 

 

Nick huffed out another sigh, taking in Steve again-- still sitting stiff and tall, but shaking just barely visibly. Some complex expression filled his eye, and he grasped Steve on the shoulder. He clenched his jaw against pain, like Nick's hand was burning him, and Sam knew shit had hit the fan. His hands were scratching absently at his wrists. His eyes were starting to squint against the light. 

 

"You should go." Sam spoke up. Fury fixed his eye on him. 

 

"Get better soon, Cap. The world needs you."

 

"Get. Out." Barnes growled, looking more like the Soldier than himself as he glared at Nick, even as he gave them a nod and headed for the elevator. 

 

They didn't move until the door had closed behind him. 

 

It was like flicking a switch. Steve's breathing went ragged and pained, he was torn between scratching gouges into his skin and clapping his hands over his ears, making horrible, familiar wheezing and whimpering sounds. 

 

"Stevie" Buck was all himself again, not a trace of anger, only overflowing worry as he knelt in front of him on the sofa. "Sam, get his phone, turn down the earbuds to just our voices." He tried to hold Steve's hands, grounding and keeping him from hurting himself more. The touch only made him shriek behind his teeth, and Sam's heart clenched in his chest. 

 

He did what Bucky asked and then went to sit on the far end of the sofa, away from Steve, but still close. Barnes was whispering and cooing, refusing to let go of Steve's hands until they relaxed in his hold, rubbing his thumbs across the knuckles. It was soothing just to look at, and Steve's muscles agonizingly slowly unknotted themselves. 

 

Almost an hour passed before he took a deep breath and collapsed into Bucky's arms, still trembling through the aftershocks of his fit. Barnes helped him get up and walk to the bedroom, mumbling about a warm shower and how much he loved him. 

 

Sam didn't follow, he had nothing to offer. 

 

It wasn't until Steve was curled back up in bed, the calm, contented feelings of the morning forgotten, that Sam went in to assess the damage Fury had inflicted. 

 

Barnes had curled around him, stroking up and down the notches of his spine. Steve was staring blankly into the room, looking like it took effort to breathe. Sam had seen that look before, on those vets that never returned to the VA, and he could just cry. He wanted to scream and punch and show Fury exactly what he had done-- they had been so close. He was doing so well. 

 

"Hey man, how're you feelin'?" 

 

No answer, no acknowledgement. Just looking straight ahead. Barnes looked ten times as exhausted as he had that morning, meeting Sam's eyes and just shaking his head. 

 

"Rogers, you in there?" 

 

Nothing. Square one, all over again. Maybe even worse. 

 

Sam's legs seemed to come out from under him and he was sitting on the edge of the bed. There nothing he could do right then, and the helplessness swallowed him. Sam just sat next to his friends and cried. 

 

He wasn't sure how long it lasted, but his head ached and his sinuses were plugged. Something had changed though, and Sam looked down to see Steve's pale hand resting over his own. His eyes were barely open, red-rimmed and tired, but he was definitely looking at him when he said " 'M sorry, Sammie."


End file.
